F 

152. 

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Class 
Book 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



AN 



INQUIRY INTO THE EVIDENCE 



RELATING TO THE 



CHARGES BROUGHT BY LORD MACAULAY 



WILLIAM PENN 



BY JOHN PAGET, ESQ. 



earkister-at-law 



" I know my enemies, and their true character and histoi-y, and tlieir 
intrinsic value to this or other Governments ; I commit them to time, 
with my own conduct and aiflictions."— iet<er of William Penn. 1693. 



WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS 

EDINBURGH AND LONDON 

MDCCCLVIII 



INTRODUCTION. 



My attention was jSrst directed to the sub- 
ject of the following pages by finding in 
Lord Macaulay's picture of William Penn 
a character, so inconsistent with itself, that 
one would not expect to meet with it 
until we discover a country inhabited by 
centaurs, or succeed in catching a living 
mermaid. I was thus led to examine the 
authorities on which he relies. A short time 
served to convince me that the dark stains 
with which he has disfigured the portrait of 
Penn were not to be found in the original, 
but owed their existence solely to the jaun- 
diced eye of the artist. I have endeavoured, 



IV INTEODUCTION. 

in the following pages, to collect into a small 
compass all the evidence I could meet with 
on the subject, in the hope that by so doing 
I might enable others, with less labour, to 
form their own opinions upon a question 
which involves, not only the character of the 
dead, which has become a sacred trust in the 
hands of the living, but also the degree of 
confidence which ought to be placed in the 
statements of the most popular and eloquent 
of modern writers. I have examined for 
myself the different documents referred to, 
having been enabled to do so by the libe- 
rality of the Right Hon. S. H. Walpole, and 
the kind assistance which I have received 
from the Gentlemen in whose immediate 
custody the documents preserved in the State- 
Paper and Privy Council Offices are deposited. 
It appeared to me, that notwithstanding what 
has already been done by Mr Hepworth Dixon 
and others, matters of considerable interest 
still remained to be gleaned ; I have therefore 



INTEODUCTION. y 

done my best to collect them, and to lay tlieni 
before the reader in as concise a form as pos- 
sible. Lord Macaulay in the present year has 
reiterated his charges, and in some instances has 
attempted to justify them. The issue, upon the 
character of William Penn and the trustworthi- 
ness of Lord Macaulay, is therefore now fairly 
before the public. 

J. P. 



3 Brick Court, Temple, 

Nov. 1858. 



AN INQUIRY, &c. 



" Rival nations and hostile sects liaye agreed in 
" canonising him— England is proud of his name. 
" A great commonwealth beyond the Atlantic 
" regards him with a reverence similar to that 
" which the Athenians felt for Theseus, and the 
" Romans for Quirinus. The respectable society 
" of which he was a member honours him as an 
" apostle. By pious men of other persuasions 
" he is generally regarded as a bright pattern 
" of Christian virtue. Meanwhile admirers of a 
" very different sort have sounded his praises. 
" The French philosophers of the eighteenth 
" century pardoned what they regarded as his 
" superstitious fancies, in consideration of his 
" contempt for priests, and of his cosmopoHtan 
" beneyolence, impartially extended to all races 
" and all creeds. His name has thus become. 



A 



^ CHAEACTEE OF PENN. 

" throughout all civilised countries, a synonyme 
" for probity and philanthropy." 

Such is the verdict of posterity upon the cha- 
racter of William Penn, recorded in the glowing 
words of Lord Macaulay.^ Such is the judgment 
which Lord Macaulay seeks to reverse ;— to show 
instead that this same William Penn prostituted 
himself to the meanest wishes of a cruel and 
profligate court 2— gloated with delight on the 
horrors of the scaffold and the stake'— was the 
willing tool of a bloodthirsty and treacherous 
tyrant '—a trafficker in simony and suborner of 
perjury'— a conspirator, seeking to deluge his 
country in blood'— a sycophant, a traitor,^ and 

a liar.^ 

Such are the charges scattered through Lord 
Macaulay's pages ; and in support of them he 
relies on the part taken by Penn on the follow- 
ing occasions : — 

I. His conduct with regard to the Maids of 
Taunton.— Vol. i. p. 655. 

• Vol. i. p. 506. ' Vol. ii. p. 298, 299. 
^ Vol. i. p. 656. ' Vol. iv. p. 20, 31. 

' Vol. i. p. 665. ' Vol. iii. p. 587. 

* Vol. ii. p. 230. ' Vol. iii. p. 599. 



LORD MACAULAY's CHARGES. 3 

ir. His presence at the executions of Cornish and 

of Gaunt.— Vol. i. p. 665. 
Ill His conduct in the affair of Kiffin. — Vol. ii. 

p. 230. 
IV. The transactions relating to Magdalen College. 

—Vol. ii. p. 298. 
V His supposed communication with James II. 
whilst in Ireland. — Vol. iii. p. 587. 
VI. His alleged falsehood in a su|)posed interview 

with William III — Vol. iii. p. 599. 
VII. His alleged share in Preston's plot. — Vol. iv. 
p. 20. 
VIII His interview with Sidney. — Vol. iv. p. 30. 
IX. His alleged communications with James whilst 
the latter was at St Germains. — Vol. iv. 
p. 31. 

1 purpose to examine the evidence relating to 
each of these charges. I shall confine myself as 
much as possible to original and unquestionable 
documents, and I shall in every case indicate the 
evidence on which I rely, and the most easy 
mode in which the reader, if so disposed, maj 
verify my statements if true, or detect their in- 
accuracy if I have fallen into error. On most 



4 EVIDENCE ABUNDANT. 

points the evidence is abundant and easily to be 
obtained. Lord Macaulay calls Penn "rather 
a mythical than an historical person." ^ Never 
was a less appropriate epithet. Penn lived 
much in public. During his whole life he was 
in contest with some one or other. His birth, 
education, and position, were such as to expose 
him to constant observation. He was a prolific 
writer — a copious correspondent. The personal 
friend of Algernon Sidney, John Locke, and Arch- 
bishop Tillotson — of King James the Second, 
and of George Fox — probably no man ever lived 
who was the connecting link between men so 
diverse and so hostile. A courtier, a scholar, 
and a soldier, he resigned every worldly advan- 
tage, and left the gayest court in Europe to take 
up his cross amongst the humblest and most 
peaceful of the followers of his Redeemer. Such 
a man was certain to be the object of calumny 
in his own day ; and, accordingly, we find that 
there was hardly an act of Penn's life which was 
not the subject of hostile comment. To speak 
of him as a " mythical rather than an historical 
person," is therefore simply absurd. 

1 Vol. i. p. 506. 



I. 



The First in order on the black list of Lord 
Macaulaj's charges, relates to the conduct of 
William Penn with regard to the " Maids of 
Taunton." 

Upon the entry of Monmouth into that town, 
and on the occasion of his declaring himself heir 
to the throne, proclaiming himself King, setting 
a price on the head of the reigning monarch, and 
denouncing the Parliament then sitting as an un- 
lawful assembly,! he was received by a procession 
of the daughters of the principal inhabitants of 
the place, headed by their schoolmistress, bearing 
the emblems of royalty, who presented him with 
standards worked by their own hands.2 That 
every person concerned in this proceeding incur- 
red thereby the penalties of high treason, there 
can be no doubt. But it does not appear ever 

1 Macaulat, i. 588. Toulmin's Hist, of Taunton, 

2 Macaulat, i. p. 584-586. 4to, 1791, p. 136. 



() THE PAEDON BROKERS — 

to have been contemplated bj James, or even bj 
Jeffreys, to enforce the rigour of the law against 
girls, some of whom were not more than ten years 
of age. In those days, however, mercy was not 
given, but sold. A pardon for the prisoner who 
had been tried in the morning, is said to have 
been tossed by the judge who condemned him, 
to the companion of his evening debauch, who 
the next day made the best bargain he could 
with the culprit or his friends.^ From the highest 
to the lowest the infamous traffic prevailed. The 
Court and the Bench shared in the corruption, 
and, as might be expected, a swarm of inferior 
agents and dealers in iniquity sprang up. The 
names of some of these have been preserved, and 
appear in the registers of the Privy Council, in 
the Secret Service Book of Charles and James 
the Second, and in the records of those families 
whose members were the victims of their rapacity. 
Robert Brent occupies the most prominent place. 
His name occurs repeatedly. After the revolu- 
tion, a proclamation was issued for his appre- 
hension.^ 

After Brent comes George Penne, whose 

1 Macaulay, i. 653. ' PrL Co. Rey. 27 Feb. 168f . 



EOBEET BEENT AND GEOEGE PENNE. 7 

name has been preserved in consequence of his 
having been employed to negotiate the pardon of 
Azariah Pinnej, a member of a Somersetshire 
family who had been involved in Monmouth's 
rebellion.^ 

George Penne's infamous trade appears not to 
have prospered. Probably his business became 
less lucrative when the wholesale slaughter con- 
sequent on the suppression of Monmouth's rebel- 
lion ceased. We find him some time afterwards 
an applicant to the Crown for the grant of a 
patent ofiice for the establishment of a lottery 
and licensing gaming-tables in America. 

His petition for this purpose was presented to 
the Privy Council during the time when Sunder- 
land was President ; and Sunderland attended 



1 "Bristol, Sejjtemher 1685. Rector of Norton-sub-Hamdeu, 

— Mr John Pinney is debitor to near Yeovil. Azariah Pinney 

money pd Geo. Penne, Esquire, was sentenced to death and par- 

for the ransom of my Bror Aza. doned, and " given to Jerome 

August, 1685. £65." Entry Nipho, Esquire." His destina- 

iu the cash - book preserved tion was the island of Nevis, 

at Somerton Erlegh House, but he was redeemed, and Mr 

cited in Dixon's Life of Penn. Nipho received through George 

Edit. 1851, p. 445. Ed. 1856, Penne the sum of £65 as his 

xix. Azariah Pinney of Battis- ransom. — See Roberts's Life of 

comb was a son of the Reverend Monmouth, ii. 243. 
John Pinney of Broad Windsor, 



8 THE MAIDS OF HONOUE. 

in person the meeting at which it was discussed.^ 
It is not stated whether he was successful in his 
appUcation ; but he disappears from history, 
and his name would probably have been ut- 
terly forgotten by this time had it not been pre- 
served to be the occasion of an unfortunate 
mistake, consequent upon its similarity to that 
borne by the celebrated founder of Pennsylva- 
nia. But for this, George Penne would have 
shared the fate of the obscure crowd of his fel- 
low-w^orkers in iniquity who have passed into 
utter oblivion. 

When it had been resolved that the lives of 
the " Maids of Taunton" (as these school children 
have been called) should be spared, the King 
" gave their fines to the Maids of Honour." ^ 
In other words, he permitted the Maids of 
Honour to extort as much money from the fears 
and affections of the parents and relations of 
these unhappy children as they could. 

The Maids of Honour apphed to the Duke of 
Somerset (the Lord-Lieutenant of the county), 
and he had recourse to Sir Francis Warre, 

1 Pri. Co. Reg. J. R. 540. ^ Letter of Sunderland, pos^, 

p. 12. 



THE DUKE OF SOMERSET. 9 

colonel of the Taunton Eegiment, who had re- 
peatedly sat in parliament for that town, and 
who then resided at Hestercombe, in the imme- 
diate neighbom'hood. To him the Duke ad- 
dressed the following letter : — 

" I do here send you a list of the Taunton 
" Maydes. You living soe near to Taunton 
" makes me think that you know some of them, 
" therefore pray send me word by the first opor- 
" tunity whether any of these are in custody, and 
" whoe they are ; and if any one of these are not 
" in custody, lett them be secured, especially the 
" schoolemistress, and likewise send me word if 
" you know any one of these, because there are 
" some friends of mine that I believe upon easy 
" termes might get theire pardon of the King. 
" Pray send me an answer by the first opor- 
" tunity, and in so doing this you will oblige 
" your humble servant, — Someeset.^ 
" London, Dec. 12, 1685." 

Sir Francis Warre's reply has not been pre- 
served ; but it would seem that, between the date 

1 Toulmin's Hist, of Taunton, p. 163, 4to, 1791. 



10 CORRESPONDENCE WITH 

of this letter — viz. 12th of December 1685 — 
and the end of the year, some person of the name 
of Birde,^ who is stated by Lord Macaulay to 
have been town-clerk of Bridgewater,^ had inter- 
fered in the transaction ; for, on the 14th of 
January 1685-6, the Duke of Somerset again 
writes as follows : — 

" I have acquainted the Maydes of Honour 
" with this buiseness of Mr Birde, and they do 
" all say that he never had any authority from 
" them to proceede in this matter, and that they 
" have this post writ to him not to trouble him- 
" selfe any more in this affaire, soe that if you 
" will proceede on this matter according to my 
" former letter, you will infinitely oblige your 
" humble servant, — Somerset. 

" Jan. 14, 1685." 

" If you can secure any of them, pray doe, and 

*' let me have account of this letter as soon as 

" you can. 

" For Sir Francisse Warre, Bart. To be left at the post- 
house in Taunton, Somersets." 



1 Mac. Edit. 1858, ii. 239, 2 Query— oi Taunton? See 
note. TouLMiN, Hist, of Taunton, 163. 



SIK FEANCIS WAEEE. 11 

The next letter that has been preserved is 
also from the Duke of Somerset to Sir Francis 
Warre, and is dated within a week of the one 
last quoted. 

" We have here thought fitt that things would 
" be better managed if there was a letter of Attur- 
" nej given to somebody (that jou should think fit 
" and capable of) for to ajde and assist jou in 
" it that there may be noe other to transact this 
" businesse but jourselfe, and another of your re- 
" commending, that should bussle and stir about 
" to ease you. If that you know of any such man 
" that you can trust, pray let me know it by the 
" first oportunity, that the Maydes of Honour 
" may signe his letter of Atturney. Pray let 
" them know that if they doe thus put it off 
" from time to time that the Maydes of Honour 
" are resolved to sue them to an Outlawry, so 
" that pray do you advise them to comply with 
" what is reasonable (which I think 7000 is) for 
'' them. 

" I must beg a thousand times over your 
" pardone for giving you this trouble, and will 
" never omit anything wherein I can serve you, 



12 THE EARL OF SUNDERLAND'S 

" Sir. I am, jour very humble servant, — 
" Somerset. 

" London, Jan. 21, 1685-6. 

" For Sir Francisse Warre, Bart: To be left at the post- 
house in Taunton, Somersetts." 

Immediately after this suggestion, that Sir 
Francis Warre should name some subordinate 
agent to " bustle and stir about,'' and that the 
Maids of Honour should send a letter of 
attorney for that purpose, comes the following 
letter from the Earl of Sunderland, of which a 
copy is preserved amongst a very miscellaneous 
collection, entitled " Domestic — Various," in the 
State-Paper Office : — 

" Whitehall, Feb. 13, 1685-6. 
" Mr Penne, — Her Majesty's Maids of Honour 
" having acquainted me that they design to em- 
" ploy you and Mr Walden in making a composi- 
" tion with the relations of the Maids of Taunton 
" for the high misdemeanour they have been 
" guilty of, I do, at their request, hereby let you 
" know, that His Majesty has been pleased to 
" give their fines to the said Maids of Honor, 



LETTER TO " MR PENNE." 13 

" and therefore recommend it to Mr Walden and 
" joii to make the most advantageous composi- 
" tion jou can in their behalfe.^ — ^I am, Sir, jour 
" humble servant, — Sunderland." 

Here ends the whole of what can properly be 
called evidence upon the subject. We shall 
presently have to examine the accounts given by 
different Historians of the transaction, — to con- 
sider what reliance is to be placed on the nar- 
ratives of some, and what inferences are fairly 
to be drawn from the silence of others. But 
here, resting upon this affirmative testimony 
alone, it may fairly be asked. Can any reason- 
able doubt exist that the Mr Penne to whom 
the letter of Sunderland is addressed was the 
same George Penne who, at the same time, and 
in the same county, was employed in negotiat- 
ing a similar transaction in the case of Azariah 
Pinney ^ 

Lord Macaulay,"^ however, declares his con- 
viction, unaltered and unalterable, that this curt 
missiA^e of Sunderland, tliough addressed to " Mr 
Penne " — though written immediately upon the 

1 Mac. edit. 1858, ii. 236, note. 



14 LORD MACAU ay's CHAEGE. 

suggestion that "somebody" should be named, 
to " bustle and stir about," and to " ease and 
assist" Sir Francis Warre, to whom the Duke 
of Somerset was so profuse in his apologies for 
" the trouble he gave him "■ — though " George 
Penne " was exactly such a person, and was en- 
gaged at this very time upon precisely similar 
business in the same county, and therefore most 
likely to be known both to Warre and Somerset, 
— and although no allusion to any other person 
of the name of " Penne " or " Penn," except 
George Penne, is to be found in the transaction 
— yet that this letter was addressed, not to him, 
but to William Penn, the Lord Proprietor of the 
province of Pennsylvania, the friend of Algernon 
Sidney and John Locke, the ward and intimate 
associate of the King — with whom James was in 
the habit of conferring for hours, whilst the first 
nobles of the kingdom were kept waiting in the 
ante-chamber^ — whose house was crowded by 
hundreds of suitors^ — who occupied at that mo- 
ment a social position far higher than that of 
Sir Francis Warre — with whom Sunderland had 
been intimate from boyhood — whose associate 

i Mac. edit. 1838, ii. 82, note. 2 i^jd. 



SILENCE OF COTEMPOEAEY HISTOEY. 15 

and companion he had been at college — and with 
whom he must at this very time have been in 
almost daily intercourse. 

It may be asked, Upon what evidence does 
Lord Macaulay ground this supposition '? The 
answer is, Simply upon none. It is fair, however, 
to state that he is not the originator of the ca- 
lumny ; and before discussing the reasons which 
in his opinion justify him in repeating and giving 
it currency and authority, it will be well to trace 
the origin of the charge. We have seen the 
whole of the evidence — we now come to the 
history. 

No cotemporary historian that I have been 
able to discover, mentions either William Penn 
or George Penne as having had anything what- 
ever to do with the transaction. 

Oldmixon asserts that Brent and a person of 
the name of Crane were employed.-^ Ralph says 

^ " This money " [L e. the " paid themselves very bounti- 

suras paid for the pardons], "and " fully out of the money which 

" a great deal more, was said to " was raised by this means ; 

" be for the Maids of Honour ; " some instances of which are 

" whose agent Brent, the Popish " within my knowledge." — Old- 

" lawyer, had an under-agent, mixon, vol. ii. p. 708. Lord 

" one Crane of Bridgewater, and Macaulay says that Oldmixon is, 

" 'tis supposed that both of them of all our historians, " the least 



16 



SILENCE OF COTEMPOEARY HISTORY. 



that tlie Maids of Honour " sent down an agent/' 
but does not say who that agent was.^ 

Other cotemporarj historians are silent. The 
only inference to be drawn from them, therefore, 
is derived from the extreme improbability that 
they would have been silent if a man so eminent 



" trustworthy ;" that he "asserts 
nothing positively ; " that he 
" goes no further than ' it was 
" * said,' and ' it was reported,' " 
and that even "his most posi- 
" tive assertion " would in this 
case be of "no value." Lord 
Macaulay seems to have over- 
looked the statement which Old- 
mixon makes that some of the 
instances were within his own 
knowledge. One thing is cer- 
tain, namely, that had Old- 
mixon ever heard that William 
Penn had any share in the 
transaction, he would have re- 
corded it with exultation. Lord 
Macaulay appears also to have 
forgotten that he had himself 
cited Oldmixon no less than 
seventeen times, as an authority 
for his narrative of the events 
connected with Monmouth's in- 
surrection — that he had three 
times drawn attention to the 
fact, that " Oldmixon, when a 
*' boy, lived near the scene of 
"these events" — that he was, 



probably, an eye-witness of some 
of them, and that he passed a 
great part of his life at Bridge- 
water. That such was the con- 
fidence to be placed in him, that 
his silence on the subject was 
sufficient to negative the truth 
of a well-known and horrible 
anecdote popularly believed of 
the monster Kirke. Such is the 
mode in which the authority of 
Oldmixon is treated by Lord 
Macaulay, when Kirke, who 
added to, or, as Lord Macaulay 
appears to think, atoned for, his 
enormities by treachery to the 
master in whose service he had 
committed them, is to be vin- 
dicated. — When Penn is to be 
traduced Oldmixon becomes the 
" least trustworthy" of " all our 
historians," and his most posi- 
tive assertion of no value ! — 
Vol. i. pp. 581, 604, 613, 636, 
edit. 1849. Vol. iii. p. 226, 1855. 
Vol. iii. pp. 244, 256, edition 
1858. 
1 Ralph, vol. i. p. 893. 



SILENCE OF COTEMPORAEY HISTORY, 17 

and so obnoxious to many of them as William 
Penn had been concerned in the transaction. 
That thej should pass over, or be entirely igno- 
rant of, the doings of the obscure George Penne, 
is by no means unlikely. Sir Francis Warre's 
part of the correspondence with the Duke of 
Somerset has, unfortunately, been lost ; but it 
will be observed that there is nothing in the 
Duke's letters from which it can be inferred 
that Sir Francis Warre was reluctant to be 
employed, or considered such employment in 
any way disgraceful. With the lapse of time,* 
however, the matter came to be regarded from 
a very different point of view ; and when Dr 
Toulmin applied, at the close of the last cen- 
tury, to the descendant of Sir Francis Warre, 
who supphed him with the letters from the 
Duke to his ancestor, he was informed that " Sir 
" Francis Warre, unwilling to be concerned in 
" the business, represented to the Duke that 
" the schoolmistress was a woman of mean birth, 
" and that the scholars worked the banner by 
" her orders, without knowing of any offence. 
" On this, further proceedings were dropped, but 
"not until the sums of £100 and £50 had 

B 



18 AND OF FAMILY TRADITION. 

" been gained from the parents of some of 
" them." 1 

By the time that Dr Touhnin wrote his his- 
tory, ^ the transaction had come to be considered 
as bj no means reputable ; and we need not be 
surprised that the family tradition should be that 
Sir Francis Warre was unwilling to be concerned 
in it ; but had he handed it over to a man so 
eminent as William Penn, it can hardly be sup- 
posed that so important a fact could have been 
forgotten ; yet we find no trace of it. 

We now come to the origin of the calumny. 

Nearly one hundred and fifty years after the 
events had taken place, Sir James Mackintosh 
happened to meet with the letter from Sunder- 
land to Penne which has been already quoted. 
He appears not to have accurately examined the 
previous correspondence between Somerset and 
Warre, and he was certainly in ignorance of the 
existence of any such person as George Penne. 
With unaccountable haste, he jumped to the 
conclusion that the person to whom this letter 
was addressed must have been William Penn ; 

^ Toulmin's History of Taun- ^ Published 1791. 

fo»,8vo,p.533;4to,1791,p. 163. 



ORIGIN OF THE CALUMNY. 19 

and even in citing the letter, lie commits the 
mistake of stating that it was addressed to Wil- 
liam Fenn, — the fact being, that no Christian 
name at all is used in the original, and that it is 
addressed, not to William Penn, but to Mr 
Penne.i 

The passage in Mackintosh is as follows :— 
" It must be added with regret that William 
Penn, sacrificing other objects to the hope of 
obtaining the toleration of his religion from the 
King's favour, was appointed an agent for the 
Maids of Honour, and submitted to receive in- 
structions to make the most advantageous com- 
position he could in their behalf." " The con- 
tinuer of Mackintosh adopts the statement, and 
adds, that Penn went down to Taunton f in sup- 
port of which assertion he cites Ralpli, who, as 
we have seen, never mentions Penn in the matter, 
but sajs that the Maids of Honour sent down 
" an agent." That Lord Macaulaj should have 
followed Mackintosh without inquiry in the ori- 

1 Sir James Mackintosh cites and trusted to some careless 

it thus : — '* Lord Sunderland to transcriber. 
William Penn, 13th Feb. 1686. ^ Mack. p. 32. 4to. 
State-Paper Office." Probably ^ Wallace's Continuation of 

he did not examine the original, Mackintosh, vol. viii. p. 42. 



20 SIE JAMES mackintosh's MISTAKE. 

ginal edition, should liardlj excite surprise ; but 
after liaAdng had his attention drawn to the evi- 
dence, which was not in the possession of Mack- 
intosh, and the origin of the mistake pointed out,^ 
he declares his determination to adhere to his ori- 
ginal statement, and justifies that determination 
at great length in a note to the edition of his 
History just published, ^ upon the following 
grounds : — 

First, That Sir James Mackintosh had no 
doubt about the matter.^ 

The autlioritj of Sir James Mackintosh is un- 
questionably high. But Sir James Mackintosli 
would have been the first to admit the possibility 
that he might be led into error by deficient in- 
formation, or by the mistake of a transcriber, and 
the first to correct that error. Lord Macaulay 
is put into possession of the evidence which Sir 
James Mackintosh had not, and the mistake of 
the transcriber is pointed out. Sir James Mackin- 
tosh is dead, and cannot correct the error ; Lord 



' Dixon's Life of Penn. Sup- ^ Mac. edit. 1858, ii. 286, 
plementary chapter. note. 

2 Edit. 1858, p. 236. 



LOED macaulay's aegument — 21 

Macaulay is living, and will not.^ The argu- 
ment derived from tlie aiitlioritj of Sir James 
Mackintosh, under these circumstances, must go 
for as much as it is worth. 

Secondly, Th^t the names "Penn" and "Penne" 
are the same. Lord Macaulaj admits that both 
William Penn, and his father the Admiral, mva- 
riahly spelt the name Penn, but urges that 
other people sometimes spelt it Pen and Penne : 
that Hide is sometimes Hyde ; Jeffi'ies, JefFeries, 
JefFerejs, and Jeffreys : that Somers is Som- 
mers, and Summers ; Wright is Wrighte ; and 
Cowper, Cooper. 

The letter of Sunderland is addressed to "Mr 
Penne ; " and every one except Lord Macaulay 

^ Yet there are cases in which that he had confused the Town 
Lord Macaulay has shown more Guard with the dragoons of Dun- 
candour and a juster spirit. In dee, and Graham their captain 
the first edition, voL i. p. 561, with Graham of Claverhouse. 
describing the execution of Ar- Edit, of 1858, ii, 139. When 
gyle, he says, " the troops who Lord Macaulay penned this cor- 
attended the procession were put rection, did his conscience recall 
under the command of Claver- to him the bitter scorn with 
house, the fiercest and stoutest whichheonceheldupabrother- 
of the race of Graham." Thus essayist to contempt for refer- 
it stood in five editions. Mr Ay- ring to the axe instead of the 
toun pointed out the error,* and halter, as the instrument by 
in 1858 Lord Macaulay admits which Montrose met his death ? 

♦ Lays of the Cavaliers, Appendix, 348. 



22 "penn" and "penne." 

will allow that, prima facie , a letter is intended 
for the person whose name is correctly given on 
its address, and not for a person whose name is 
not correctly given. 

On the other liand, it must be admitted that, 
in the great majority of cases. Lord Macaulay's 
argument is correct, and that much reliance 
ought not to be placed on this fact if it stood 
alone. There are, however, peculiar circum- 
stances attending the case. In the very same 
books in the State -Paper and Privy Council 
Offices in which the name of George Penne 
occurs, the name of William Penn also occurs 
repeatedly ; and there is not a single instance 
in which it is spelt otherwise than Penn. It is 
admitted by Lord Macaulay that William Penn, 
and his father, the Admiral, invariably spelt 
the name Penn. Is it likely that Sunderland, 
who had known, and been intimate with, William 
Penn from his boyhood, who must liave been in 
constant intercourse with him at this very time, 
should have deviated from this well-known ortho- 
graphy in this single instance ? 

If there ever was a case in which reliance 
should be placed on such a fact, surely it is this. 



WHO WAS THE AGENT ? 23 

Thirdly, Lord Macaulaj urges that it is im- 
probable that the Maids of Honour would have 
employed such an agent as George Penne ; that 
Sir Francis Warre was a man of high rank and 
consideration, and therefore it is unlikely that so 
low a fellow as George Penne should be em- 
ployed in the transaction. 

It is exactly because he was a low fellow that he 
was employed. He was the agent to " bustle and 
stir about "1 amongst the relatives of the girls, and 
wring the uttermost farthing from them. If an 
agent had been required to communicate with 
the King, and to obtain their pardon, William 
Penn might possibly have been applied to ; but 
this had been already done. The pardon was 
obtained, and all that remained was to make the 
best bargain with the relatives of the children. 
For this George Penne, not William Penn, was 
the fitting agent. 

Fourthly, Lord Macaulay says that no in- 
ference should be drawn from the abrupt and 
uncourteous style of the note or the conjunction 
of the obscure Mr Walden with the King's per- 
sonal friend and the lord-proprietor of a province, 

1 Duke of Somerset's Letter to Warre, ante, p. 11. 



24 LOED macaulay's 

because tlie Marquess of Welleslej,wlienGoYernor 
of India, addressed liis brother General Welleslej, 
in official communications, witli the formality of 
" Sir/^ 

It would have been well, if, before using this 
argument. Lord Macaulaj had observed the tone 
of the Duke of Somerset's letters to Sir Francis 
Warre, and asked himself whether those of Lord 
Sunderland to WiUiam Penn were likelj to be 
less courteous ? Let the reader picture to him- 
self the terms in which Lord Sunderland would 
have announced to the Duke of Somerset, and to 
Sir Francis Warre, tliat the King's personal and 
confidential friend had condescended to take 
upon himself to " bustle and stir about," to " ease 
" and assist," the Somersetshire Baronet, and the 
profuse expressions of* gratitude which he would 
have been charged to express on the part of the 
Maids of Honour, and then let him turn to the 
letter to " Mr Penne," and ask himself whether 
the language is most adapted to William Penn 
or to George Penne '? 

Fifthly, Lord Macaulaj has one argument 
left, and one only. 

It is, that such is his opinion, and such shall 



LAST ARGUMENT. 25 

be his opinion. This is the only argument of 
Lord Macaiilaj which it is impossible to answer. 
It is the same reasoning which was considered 
by Lord Peter to be conchisive in the great de- 
bate between himself and his brothers, Martin 
and Jack, when they respectfully submitted that 
his brown loaf was not mutton. " Look ye, 
" gentlemen, cries Peter in a rage, to con- 
" vince you what a couple of blind, positive, 
" ignorant, wilful puppies you are, I will use 
" but this plain argument : By G — , it is good 
" true natural mutton as any in Leadenhall 
" market, and confound you both eternally if 
" you offer to believe otherwise." ^ 

^ Tale of a Tab, p. 120. 



11. 



The Second charge brought by Lord Macaulay 
against William Penn is of a nature singularly 
revolting. 

Of the many judicial murders which disgraced 
that period of our history, none were more in- 
famous or more cruel than those of which Cor- 
nish and Gaunt were the victims. The former 
was executed with all the detailed horrors of the 
sentence in cases of high treason, and the latter 
was burnt alive. The executions took place on 
the same day. William Penn was present at 
both. Lord Macaulay says : " William Penn, 
''for ivliom exhibitions, which humane men 
" generally avoid, seem to have had a strong 
" attraction, hastened from Cheapside, where 
'' he had seen Cornish hanged, to Tyburn, in 
" order to see Elizabeth Gaunt burned." ^ 

This malignant insinuation against Penn\s 

^ Vol. i. p. 665, edit. 1849 ; vol. ii. p. 249, edit. 1858. 



EXECUTION OF COENISH. 



27 



well-known character for liumanitj would de- 
serve nothing but contempt, did it come from 
anj one less eminent than Lord Macaulaj. It 
was by the constancy of Penn when the nerve of 
Calamy had failed, and he had refused to accom- 
pany Cornish to the scaffold, ^ that his memory 
was rescued from the slander that he died mad 
or drunk.'-^ It is from Penn that we know 
the meek courage with which Elizabeth Gaunt 
submitted to her cruel martyrdom ^ — Juxon stood 



^ *' He often visited him iu 
Newgate, and, being earnestly 
pressed to go along with him to 
the place of execution, was not 
able to do it, but freely told him 
' he would as well die with him 
as bear the sight of his death in 
such circumstances as he was 
in.' " — Life of Calamy, vol. i. 
p. 61. 

It may be observed that the 
nephew of Calamy, afterwards 
the celebrated Nonconformist 
divine, was present at the exe- 
cution of Cornish as well as 
Penn, and has left an account 
of it. — Life of Calamy, uh. su- 
pra. 

2 " He was drunk, they said, 
or out of his mind, when he was 
turned oflf." — Macaulay, ii. 247, 
1858. 



" Cornish at his death as- 
serted his innocence with great 
vehemence, and with some acri- 
mony complainedof the methods 
taken to destroy him ; and so 
they gave it out that he died in 
a fit of fury. But Pen, who 
saw the execution, said to me, 
there appeared nothing but a 
just indignation that innocence 
might very naturally give."' — 
Burnett, iii. 61. 

3 " She died with a constancy, 
even to cheerfulness, that struck 
all that saw it. She said, charity 
was a part of her religion as 
well as faith. This, at worst, was 
the feeding an enemy ; so she 
hoped she had her reward with 
him for whose sake she did this 
service, how unworthy soever 
the person was that made so ill a 



28 



EXECUTION OF COENISH 



by Charles the First at Whitehall — Tillotson and 
Burnett received the last words of Lord Russell 
on the scaffold in Lincoln's Inn Fields.-^ History, 
sacred and profane, affords other instances of 
fidelity eyen to the foot of the Cross. Were all 
these moved only by '' the strong attractions of 
exhibitions which humane men generally avoid'? " 
If not, what right has Lord Macaulay to cast so 
foul an aspersion upon a man whose memory has 
been honoured for humanity — who would not shed 



return for it. She rej oiced that 
God had honoured her to be 
the first that sufiFered by fire in 
this reign, and that her sufiering 
was a martyrdom for that reli- 
gion which was all love. Pen 
the Quaker told me he saw her 
die. She laid the straw about 
her for burning her speedily, 
and behaved herself in such a 
manner that all the spectators 
melted in tears." — Burnett, 
iii. 58. 

" There is daily inquisition 
for those engaged in the late 
plots, some die denying, as Al- 
derman Cornish, others confess- 
ing, but justifying. 

" Cornish died last sixth day 
in Cheapside, for being at the 
meeting that Lord Russell died 



for, but denied it most vehe- 
mently to the last. A woman, 
one Gaunt of Wapping, of Dr 
Moore's acquaintance, was burn- 
ed the same day at Tyburn for 
the high treason of hiding one 
of Monmouth's array; and the 
man saved came in [as witness] 
against her. She . died com- 
posedly and fearless, interpret- 
ing the cause of her death God's 
cause. Many more to be hanged, 
great and small. It is a day to 
be wise — I long to be with you, 
but the eternal God do as he 
pleases. ! be watchful ; fear 
and sanctify the Lord in your 
hearts." • — Penn to Harrison, 
Oct. 1685 ; quoted in Janney's 
'•' Life of Penn." 
1 Burnett, ii. 377. 



AND OF GAUNT. 29 

\ 

blood even in a lawful quarrel — whose long life 
is unstained bj any act of cruelty — and who, in 
countless instances, interposed to rescue the in- 
nocent victims of a tyrannical Goyernment '? 



III. 



On the 4th of April 1687, the Kmg issued his 
" Declaration for Liberty of Conscience ; " or, as 
Lord Macaulaj prefers to call it, " The Memor- 
" able Declaration of Indulc^ence." 

This celebrated State Paper well deserves a 
careful perusal. It sets forth concisely the great 
principle " that conscience ought not to be con- 
" strained, nor people forced in matters of mere 
" religion;" that all attempts to that end are 
contrary to the intent of Government — destroy 
trade — depopulate the countries in which they 
are practised — " and, finally, never obtain the 
" end to which they are employed." 

That " after all the frequent and pressing 
" endeavours used in each of the last four reims 
" to reduce this kingdom to an exact conformity 
" in religion, it was visible the success had not 
" answered the design, and that the difficulty 
*• was invincible." 



PEEEOGATIVE OF THE CEOWN. 31 

These are sentences which might liave come 
from the pen of Locke, and the truth of which 
was tardily acknowledged nearly a century and 
a half afterwards, in the repeal of the Test and 
Corporation Acts, and of the Catholic disabili- 
ties. The King then proceeds to grant his free 
pardon to all persons convicted and under sen- 
tence for " all crimes and things by them com- 
" mitted contrary to the penal laws formerly made 
" relating to religion, and the profession or exer- 
" cise thereof." So far the Declaration was not 
only wise and just, but it was strictly in accord- 
ance wath law. The power of the Crown to 
pardon such offences has never been disputed. 
But James went further ; he added the follow- 
ing fatal words : " We do likewise declare, 
" That it is our royal will and pleasure that 
" from henceforth the execution of all and all 
" manner of penal laws in matters ecclesiastical, 
" for not coming to church, or not receiving 
" the Sacrament, or for any other noncon- 
" formity to the Religion Established, or for 
"or by reason of the exercise of religion, in 
" any manner whatsoever, be immediately sus- 
" pended : and the further execution of the 



32 CONDUCT OF THE DISSENTERS. 

" said penal laws, and everj of tliem, is hereby 
'• suspended/' 

It might be wise to repeal these laws, but the 
King had no power to suspend them. The 
Crown maj pardon a murderer, but cannot, with- 
out the assent of Parliament, declare that death 
shall not in future be awarded to him who shall 
be guilty of the crime of murder. The line 
which divides the power of pardoning an act 
when done, from the power of authorising the 
doing of that act, is, however, by no means so 
strongly defined as to occasion any surprise that 
it should be overlooked by honest and even clear- 
sighted men. It was not, however, overlooked 
by Penn.i He ojjposed this unconstitutional 
act in private and in public. In the address of 
the Quakers presented by Penn to the King, the 
necessity of obtaining the concurrence of Par- 

J As- we came from Eaton many years after (upon what 

to Wmdsor, I freely, amongst occasion I shall tell more at 

other things, told Mr Penn that, large before I have done) I came 

though I was for liberty of con- to know the reason of his silence 

science I thought the King ill- which was because Mr Penn had 

advised to put out his Declara- been himself against putting it 

tion of Indulgence upon the out upon so unpopular a prero- 

dispensmg power; to which Mr ^a^n-..» _ Lawton's Memoir 

ifenn made no answer then, but JaNxNet's Life of Penn p 300 



CONDUCT OF THE DISSENTEES. 33 

liament is distinctly pointed out and insisted 
upon.^ Lord Macaulaj suppresses these facts, 
and speaks contemptuously of the address as 
" adulatory," and the speech of Penn as " more 
" adulatory still." ^ It would be difficult to find 
either an address or a speech to a crowned head 
to which the term was less applicable ; but Lord 
Macaulay makes the assertion as he makes the 
omission, and few of his readers will refer to the 
ponderous folio containing both the documents 
of which he misrepresents the character.^ 

The Dissenters were divided as to the mode 
in which the declaration should be received. 

One party braved the distant terrors of 
Popery, and gratefully accepted the freedom 
offered by the King. For this Lord Macaulay 
heaps upon them every vituperative epithet of 
the English language.^ The other adopted the 
Church of England as their protectress, and 

i " We hope the good effects See the Address in full. Life 
thereof " [*.e. of the Declaration of Penn, by Besse. Folio, i. 
for Liberty of Conscience], " for 130, 131. 
the Peace, Trade, and prosperity ^ Vol. ii. 1858, p. 483. 
of the Kingdom, will produce ^ See the " Declaration," " Ad- 
such a concurrence from the dress," and " Speech" at length ; 
Parliament as may secure it to Appendix, p. 123. 
our posterity in after times." * Vol. ii. p. 223, 482 ; 1858. 

C 



34 THE BAPTISTS. JOHN BUNYAN — 

regarded their present state of subjection, de- 
gradation, and incapacity, as a less evil than the 
more active persecution which thej dreaded if 
Popery were to obtain even toleration. To 
them Lord Macaulay awards the mede of virtue, 
wisdom, and moderation/ 

At this moment the Dissenters held the 
balance. " Then," says Lord Macaulay, " fol- 
" lowed an auction the strangest that history has 
" recorded. On one side the King, on the other 
" the Church, began to bid eagerly against each 
" other for the favours of those whom, up to that 
" time, the King and the Church had combined 
" to oppress."^ 

Tlie Baptists, who then numbered in their 
ranks the celebrated John Bunyan, were a 
powerful and important sect, well worth con- 
ciliating. Of this sect, William Kiffin, whose 
grandsons, the Hewlings, had fallen victims 
to Jeffreys, was the most influential member. 
" Great," says Lord Macaulay, " as was the 
" authority of Bunyan over the Baptists, that 

" of William Kiffin was still greater 

" The heartless and venal sycophants of White- 

1 Vol. ii. p. 225, 484 ; 1858. ^ jyj^c. ii. 216, 474 ; 1858. 



WILLIAM KIPFIN. 35 

" hall, judging bj themselves, thought that the 
" old man would be easily propitiated by an 
" alderman's gown, and by some compensa- 
" tion in money for the property which his 
" grandsons had forfeited. Penn was em- 
" ployed in the work of seduction, but to no 
" purpose/' ^ 

Was Penn employed in the work of seduc- 
tion ? Lord Macaulay asserts that he was. 
Kiffin himself, on the other hand, distinctly says 
that Penn's interference in the matter was at his 
instance, and with a view to his being excused 
the honour which it was sought to force on him. 
Two statements more diametrically opposed to 
each other cannot be conceived. The first ques- 
tion is. Which knows most about the matter '? — 
Kiifin, who was the person principally concerned 
in the transaction, and who is the only witness 
with regard to it — or Lord Macaulay, who writes 
an account of it a hundred and sixty years after 
the event ? There is a subsequent question 
which concerns the honesty of the historian, with 
which neither Kiffin nor Penn has anything to 
do, and to which I shall come presently. Kif- 

^ Vol. ii. p. 488, edit. 1858. 



36 LOED macaulay's misquotations. 

fin's account of the matter is in the following 
words : — " In a little after, a great temptation 
" attended me, which w^as a commission from the 
" King, to be one of the aldermen of the city of 
" London ; which, as soon as I heard of it, I 
" used all the means I could to be excused, 
" both by some lords near the King, and also 
" by Sir Nicholas Butler and Mr Penn. But it 
" was all in vain ; I was told that they knew I 
" had an interest that might serve the King, 
" and although they knew my ' sufferings were 
" great, in cutting off my two grandchildren, and 
" losing their estates, yet it should be made up 
" to me both in their estates, and also in what 
" honour or advantage I could reasonably desire 
" for myself." ^ 

Kiffin says he apjjlied to Sir Nicholas Butler 
and Penn to be excused. He says not one 
word of Penn applying to him. Lord Macaulay 
asserts ^ that the latter part of the passage 
" fully bears out " all that he has said, and com- 
plains that Mr Hepworth Dixon acts unfairly by 

1 Orme, Life of Kiffin,^. 85. ^ Macaulay, vol. ii. 1858, 
Exactly transcribed from the co- p. 488, note, 
py in the Brit. Museum.— J. P. 



LOED MACAULAY'S MISQUOTATIONS. 37 

terminating his quotation at the words, " but it 
" was all in vain." ^ And what does Lord Mac- 
aulaj do \ To make the passage suit his pur- 
pose, he alters it! He says, "The remainder of the 
" sentence, which fully bears out all I have said, 
" is carefully suppressed. Kiffin proceeds thus : 
" ' I was told that they (Nicholas and Penn) 
" knevf I had an interest that might serve the 
" King,' &c. &c." 

The words " Nicholas and Penn " are not 
used in this place by Kiffin : they are interpola- 
tions of Lord Macaulay's ! And this in the very 
sentence in which he is complaining that a 
quotation has stopped short at a semicolon in- 
stead of a full stop ! The words " they knew " 
TYiay grammatically mean that Nicholas and 
Penn knew ; but they by no means necessarily 
bear that meaning. The context shows that 
Kiffin used them in the sense of " on savait," or, 
" it was known." Kiffin employs Penn and his 
other friends to intercede with the King and his 
advisers. His application is unsuccessful ; and he 
is told the reason. By what means can this be 
tortured into the employment of Penn in " the 

1 Dixon's Life of Penn, p. 2J, edit. 1856. 



38 



BISHOP BUENETT : 



"work of seduction'?" Lord Macaulaj must have 
felt that the interpolation he has made was 
necessary to give even a colour of possibility to 
such a construction.^ 

Lord Macaulay has given his readers a mea- 
sure of what he considers honesty. He describes 
his great prototype Burnett ^ as " emphatically 



^ It may perhaps be said that 
these words are iu a parenthesis. 
So they would be if used by 
Kiffiu. When words are intro- 
duced which are not used by 
the author quoted, there are 
two ways of marking the fact, 
either by reversing the invert- 
ed commas, which is the most 
usual and correct mode, or by 
placing the passage in hooks, 
thus : [Nicholas and Penu]. 
Marks of parenthesis always 
mean that the parenthesis oc- 
curs in the original passage 
quoted ; were it otherwise, it 
wovild be impossible to indicate 
correctly the quotation of a pas- 
sage containing a parenthesis. 

^ " Bishop Burnett was a man 
of the most extensive knowledge 
I ever met with ; had read and 
seen a great deal, with a pro- 
digious memory and a very in- 
different judgment. He was ex- 
tremely partial, and readily took 
everything for granted that he 



heard to the prejudice of those 
he did not like, which made him 
pass for a man of less truth than 
he really was. I do not think he 
designedly published anything 
he believed to be false. 

"He had a boisterous, vehe- 
ment manner of expressing him- 
self, which often made him ridi- 
culous, especially in the House 
of Lords, when what he said 
would not have been thought so, 
delivered in a lower voice and 
a calmer behaviour. His vast 
knowledge occasioned his fre- 
quently rambling from the point 
he was speaking to, which ran 
him into discourses of so uni- 
versal a nature, that there was 
no end to be expected but from 
a failure of his strength and 
spirits, of both which he had a 
larger share than most men, 
which were accompanied with 
a most invincible assurance." — 
Lord Dartmouth's Character 
of Burnett, Preface, p. 5. 



HIS CHARACTER. 



39 



an honest man."^ He then quotes Burnett's ac- 
count of the cause of Marlborough's disgrace 



Lord Macaulay quotes a few 
words from this note as the 
testimony of an adverse wit- 
ness to Burnett's truthfulness ;* 
but he omits to state that 
at the commencement of the 
second volume of the original 
edition,+ Lord Dartmouth in- 
serted the following note : — 
" I wrote in the first volume 
of this book, that I did not be- 
lieve the Bishop designedly pub- 
lished anything he believed to 
be false ; therefore think myself 
obliged to write in this, that I 
am fully satisfied that he pub- 
lished many things that he knew 
to be so ; " and at the conclusion 
of the History he says,+ " thus 
piously ends the most partial and 
malicious heap of scandal and 
misrepresentation that ever was 
collected for the laudable design 
of giving a false impression of 
persons and things to all future 
ages." Lord Macaulay also gar- 
bles the testimony of Swift. He 
says : " Even Swift had the 
justice to say, ' After all, he ' 

* Vol. ii. p. 177. 

t Vol. iv. p. 1, Oxford edition. 

X Vol. vi. p. 168. 



[i. e. Burnett] ' was a man of 
generosity and good-nature.' " 
There Lord Macaulay inserts a 
full stop ; in the original it is a 
comma, and the sentence pro- 
ceeds as follows : " and very 
communicative ; but in his last 
ten years was absolutely party- 
mad, and fancied he saw popery 
under every bush." § 

Next to honesty, humanity is 
the virtue which Lord Macaulay 
most delights to claim for Bur- 
nett ; and to maintain his char- 
acter for it, he suppresses the 
disgraceful part which Burnett 
took in the attainder of Fen- 
wick. 

That attainder was worthy of 
the worst days of the Stewarts. 
Lord Macaulay asserts that 
William entertained a personal 
hatred of Fenwick, because six 
years before he had failed to 
uncover and bow as the Queen 
passed when she held royal 
authority in William's absence. 
" But long after her death," 
says Lord Macaulay, " a day 

§ Swift's Works, vol. xv. p. 215. 
Remarks on Bishop Burnett's His- 
tory. 



' Vol. ii. p. 177, 433 ; 1858. 



40 



BISHOP BUENETT : 



in 1692, contained in a letter written by Bur- 
nett in September 1693, and proceeds thus : 



came when lie had reason to 
wish that he had restrained his 
insolence. He found, by terrible 
proof, that of all the Jacobites, 
the most desperate assassins not 
excepted, he was the only one 
for whom William felt an in- 
tense personal aversion." * 

That day was come. Fenwick 
had been guilty of treason, but 
the law could not reach him, as 
there was but one witness of his 
guilt, and the statute required 
that there should be two. It 
was determined to immolate 
him, and a Bill of Attainder 
was resorted to. Burnett, de- 
parting from the usual rule 
which restrains bishops from 
taking a part in the affiiirs of 
blood, led the attack.f The bill 
passed the Lords by a narrow 
majority. Of a hundred and 
twenty -eight Peers, fifty -five 
voted against the second read- 
ing, and of those forty-nine pro- 
tested. The thii^d reading was 
carried by a majority of seven 
only, the numbers being 68 to 
61.J 

Fenwick petitioned the House 
of Lords to intercede with the 
King for a reprieve of two days. 



that he might prepare to die. 
The House readily granted this 
very moderate request, and or- 
dered the Bishops of London 
and Salisbury (Burnett) to 
present the address to the 
King. The " humane " Burnett 
refused. " Their lordships," he 
said, "might send him to the 
Tower, but they had no right to 
send him to Kensington." The 
indignation of the House at this 
inhuman refusal was universal. 
Rochester proposed that Bur- 
nett should be taken at his 
word and sent to the Tower for 
refusing to obey the orders of 
the House ; but Lord Scar- 
borough said, he "hoped they 
would not insist upon doing a 
hardship to the only man in the 
House who would think it one ;" 
and begged that he might him- 
self be permitted to accompany 
the Bishop of London. This 
was agreed to, ''with the ut- 
most contempt for the reverend 
Prelate."— Note by Lord Dart- 
mouth, who was present. Bue- 
NETT, iv. 34 L 

Lord Macaulay, who affects 
to give a detailed account of 
these transactions, wholly omits 



* Vol. iv. p. 33. 



t Mac. iv. 758, 759. 



t Mac. iv. 761. 



HIS INHUMANITY. 



4] 



" It is curious to compare this plain tale, told 
" while the facts were recent, with the shuffling 
" narrative which Burnett prepared for the 
" public eye many years later, ivhen MarTbo- 
" rough was closely united to the Whigs, and 
" was rendering great and splendid services 
" to the country." ^ T]ie "plain tale" being that 
Marlborough had "made his peace with King 
" James, and was engaged in a correspondence 
" with France," and that 



any allusion to this incident, 
and makes no reference to Lord 
Dartmouth's note. — See vol. iv. 
p. 768.* If it be true, as Lord 
Macaulay implies, that William 
closed his ears to the cries for 
mercy which rose around him 
from feelings of "intense per- 
sonal aversion " t — that he 
added to this the hypocrisy of 
pretending to consider that " the 
matter was one of public 
concern, and that he must de- 
liberate with his ministers " be- 
fore he decided on the petition 
which the wife of Fenwick 
offered at his feet + — that the 
last Bill of attainder by which 
any person has suffered death 

* Vol. vii. p. 402 ; 1858. t Mac. iv. 34 



he was doing all he 

in England, § was passed in 
order that he might gratify the 
feelings of revenge, which he 
entertained for a trifling slight 
offered six years previously, by 
bringing to the block, by means 
of an ex post facto law, a man 
who could not be reached by 
the arm of justice ; — if this be 
true, the world has seen no in- 
stance of more fiendish malig- 
nity. If it be false, no fouler 
slander ever issued fi'om the 
press. True or false, what must 
we think of the moral sense of 
the historian who passes it over, 
without reprobation, without 
comment, almost, it would seem, 
with approval 1 

. t Vol. iv. p. 766. § Vol. iv. p. 769. 



1 Vol. iv. p. 167. 



42 BISHOP BURNETT : 

" could to set on a faction in tlie army and 
" the nation against the Dutch." So Burnett 
wrote in 1693. The ^'Shuffling narrative" 
asserts that the orioinal cause of his dis^ace 
arose " from a quarrel about the settlement 
" of an income on the Princess Anne ;" so 
Burnett deliberately gave it to the world in 
1705.' 

So that, in Lord Macaulay's opinion, there 
may be circumstances under which it is consist- 
ent with " emphatic honesty " to prepare a de- 
liberately false account of a transaction the truth 
of which is within the knowledge of the writer, 
and to give that false account to the public 
under the form of history ! This estimate of 
what an historian owes to his party, may account 
for some passages in Lord Macaulay^s History 
which otherwise might surprise the reader. 
Penn was the object of bitter hatred and perse- 
cution on the part of those whom Lord Macaulay 
seeks to extol. He was faithful in misfortune 
to those whom Lord Macaulay seeks to de- 
grade. Those simple facts may perhaps ac- 

^ See Burn. iv. 157. 



HIS DISHONESTY. 43 

count for Lord Macaulaj's determination to 
blacken his character. The passage just cited 
shows the means which Lord Macaulay thinks 
may be used consistently with " empliatic 
" honesty." 



ly. 



Teuth and fiction are so strangely interwoven 
in the account which Lord Macaulaj gives of 
the transactions relating to Magdalen College, 
that the only mode in which they can be dis- 
entangled is by a short narrative of the facts 
and dates, and a reference to the authorities. ^ 
In the month of March 1687, the Presidentship 
of Magdalen College became vacant by the 
death of Dr Clark. The right of election was 
vested in the Fellows, but no one was eligible 
under the statutes who had not been a Fellow 
either of Magdalen or New College. The elec- 
tion was fixed for the 13th of April. 

On the 5th of that month the King issued his 
mandate, requiring the Fellows to elect one 
Anthony Farmer to the place of President. A 
more unfit selection could hardly have been 
made. Farmer was not a Fellow of either Mag- 

^ state Trials, vol. xii. p. 1. 



MAGDALEN COLLEGE. 45 

dalen or New College, and was therefore clearly 
ineligible by the statutes. He was, moreover, a 
man of dissolute life and lax ojjinions ; some ten 
years before he had been admonished by the 
authorities of Trinity College, Cambridge — to 
which he then belonged — for attending a danc- 
ing school, and had confessed the crime. He 
then committed the graver offence of becoming 
usher to Mr Benjamin Flower, a Nonconformist 
preacher, who kept a school at Chippingham, 
without license from the Bishop. He was sub- 
sequently entered of St Mary Magdalen Hall, 
where he was esteemed to be of a " troublesome 
" and unpeaceable humour." Leaving the hall, 
lie got himself admitted into Magdalen Col- 
lege, and was observed by the porter to enter 
the college late at night, his gait and speech 
both betraying symptoms unbefitting the known 
sobriety of the university. He was said (this, 
however, was supported by nothing that could 
be considered as legal evidence) to have shared 
with a profligate gentleman commoner of the 
name of Bambrigg, and his companions, whose 
names have not been preserved, and probably 
would not be worth recording, and even to 



46 ANTHONY FAEMEE'S CHAEACTEE 

have encouraged them in certain dissolute pro- 
ceedings in London. When or where these 
transactions took phice does not appear, nor 
does it seem that the worst charges were sup- 
ported by more than mere hearsay, or that Mr 
Farmer ever had the opportunity of answering 
them. He appears, however, on one occasion to 
have spent a whole day at the Lobster in Abing- 
don with Mr Clerk, Mr Graven or, and Mr Jenny- 
far, when he sat up till one in the morning. The 
next day he went to the Bush Tavern in the same 
company, and added the enormity of having a 
quarter of lamb for supper. On his return to the 
Lobster he kissed Mrs Martha Mortimer the land- 
lady, with gross rudeness, and she, like a discreet 
dame, " immediately went out of his company, 
" and would not come nigh him any more." But 
the climax of his iniquities was attained on a fatal 
night when, in company of William Hopkins, of 
Abingdon, and some others, he did, " in a frolick 
" and at an unreasonable time of night, take 
" away the town stocks from the place where they 
" constantly stood, and carried them in a cart a 
" considerable way, and threw them into a pool, 
" commonly called Mad Hall's Pool." He was 



AND DISREPUTABLE PUESUITS. 47 

certainly unfit, as well as disqualified, to be Pre- 
sident of Magdalen College.^ The town stocks, 
wliicli lie treated so contumeliouslj, would have 
been a fitter place for him. Whether he deserves 
the eloquent execration with which Lord Mac- 
aulaj has denounced him, may be doubted;^ 
history unhappily records blacker iniquities than 
any that have been charged against Anthony 
Farmer ; and abundant as Lord Macaulay's 
stores of abuse are, there are limits even to the 
foul epithets of the English language. It is 
reckless prodigality to waste so much vitupera- 
tion on so insignificant an object. There is an- 
other and more serious evil. The impetuous 
torrent of abuse sweeps the offence out of sight. 
It is impossible to remember that a man is a 
criminal when one sees him broken on the wheel. 
When Lord Macaulay describes the " frolick " 
at Abingdon in the following words, " He was 
" celebrated for having headed a disgraceful 
" riot at Abingdon," ^ one is tempted to ask how 

1 Any one who is curious as the 12th vol. of the St. Tri. p. 
to the particulars of the mis- 11 to 15. 

deeds of this very worthless per- ^ Vol. ii. p. 290 ; vol. iii. p. 21 ; 
son, will find them recorded in 1858. 

s Vol. iii. p. 21 ; 1858. 



48 HIS INELEGIBILTTY AS PEESIDENT. 

long it is since the days of Tom and Jerry ? 
whether Greenwich fair still exists 1 and whether 
sedate men, well deserving of the highest honours 
that Oxford or Cambridge can bestow, have 
always frowned so severely on such proceed- 
ings '? whether, after all, one would not rather 
like to throw the parish stocks (if such a move- 
able could be found) into Mad Hall's Pool one's- 
self? Nothing is so destructive of sound and 
healthy morality as visiting petty offences with 
the punishment due to great crimes. Lord Mac- 
aulay almost leads us to forget how mean, pro- 
fligate, and contemptible a person Anthony 
Farmer really was. The Fellows of Magdalen 
acted more wisely : they relied on his in- 
eligibility.^ They represented to the King 
that, not being of the foundation, he was in- 
capable according to the founder's statutes ; 
and they prayed his Majesty "either to leave 
" them to the discharge of their duties and con- 
" sciences, according to his Majesty's late most 
" gracious toleration and their founder's statutes, 
" or to recommend such a person who might be 
'' more serviceable to his Majesty and to the Col- 

1 St. Tri. xii. 10. 



DR HOUGH ELECTED PEESIDENT. 49 

" lege/'^ The only reply they received, after post- 
poning the election to the last moment at which 
it could be legally held, was, that " the King 
" expected to be obeyed." The Fellows took the 
bold course, adhered to their statutes, disobeyed 
the mandate of the King, and elected Dr Hough 
as their President. He was sworn and admit- 
ted. The choice of the Fellows was as judi- 
cious as that of the King had been otherwise. 
Hough was a man of character, learning, abili- 
ty, and courage, well qualified for the coming 
struggle. 

On the 6th of June following, the Vice-Presi- 
dent and Fellows were cited to appear at White- 
hall before " His Majesty's Commissioners for 
" Ecclesiastical Causes, &c.," to answer for their 
disobedience to the King's mandate ; and on the 
2 2d of the same month the Commissioners de- 
clared the election of Hough void.^ 

No further step was taken to force Farmer 
upon the College ; but on the 14th of August 
the King issued a fresh mandate, requiring the 
Fellows to elect Parker, Bishop of Oxford, to the 
place of President. 

^ St. Tr. xii. 6. 2 g^^ rp^, ^j- q^ jg^ 

D 



50 INTERVIEW OF THE KING 

On the evening of Saturday, the 3d of Sep- 
tember,^ the King, in the course of his Progress, 
arrived at Oxford, and on the following day 
required the attendance of the Fellows. Of this 
interview the folloAving curious contemporary 
jecord is preserved in the State-Paper Office : — 

September if 2ih /87. 

" The Lord Sunderland sent order to the Fel- 
" lows of Magdalene College to attend the King 
" on Sunday last at 11 o'clock, or at 3 in the 
" afternoon. 

" They attended accordingly, Dr Pudsey 
" speaker. 

"K. ' What's your name ? Are you Dr Pud- 
" seyV 

" Dr P. ' Yes, may it please your Majesty.' 

" K. ' Did you receive my letter '? ' 

" Dr P. ' Yes, sir, we did.' 

" K. ' Then you have not dealt with me like 
" gentlemen. You have done very uncivilly by 
" me, and undutifully.' Then they all kneeled 
" down, and Dr Pudsey offered a petition con- 
" taining the reasons of their proceedings, which 

1 Ath. Oxon. Life of Wood, vol. i. 275, eel. 1848 ; Ellis' Corres- 
pondence, vol. i. 337. 



WITH THE FELLOWS OF MAGDALEN. 51 

" his Majesty refused to receive, and said : ' You 
" have been a stubborn and turbulent College ; I 
" have known jou to be so this twenty-six years ; 
" you have affronted me in this. Is this your 
" Church of England loyalty '? One would won- 
" der to find so many Church of England men in 
" such a business. Goe back, and shew yourselves 
" good members of the Church of England, gett 
" ye gone ; know I am your King, and command 
" you to be gone ; goe, and admit the Bishop of 
" Oxford head, principal — what do you call it, of 
" your College '? ' One standing by said, ' Presi- 
" dent/ 

" K. * I mean President of your College. Let 
" him know that refuses it. — Looke to't ; they 
" shall find the weight of their sovereign s dis- 
" pleasure.' 

" The Fellows went away, and, being gone out, 
" were recalled. 

" K. 'I hear you have admitted a Fellow of 
" your College since you received my inhibition ; 
" is this true '? Have you admitted Mr Holden 
" Fellow r 

" Dr P. 'I think he was admitted Fellow, but 
" we conceive — ' 

" The Dr hesitating, another said, ' May it 



52 INTERVIEW OF THE KING WITH THE FELLOWS. 

" please jour Majesty, there was no new election 
" or admission since your Majesty's inhibition ; 
" but only the consummation of a former election. 
" We always elect to our year's probation, then 
'' the person elected is received or rejected for 
" ever.' 

" K. ' The consummation of a former election ; 
" 'twas downright disobedience, and 'tis a 
" fresh aggravation. Get ye gone home, and 
" immediately repair to your chappell and elect 
" the Bishop of Oxford, or else you must expect 
" to feel the heavy hand of an angry King.' 

" The Fellows offered their petition again on 
" their knees. 

" K. ' Gett ye gone ; I will receive nothing 
" from — till you have obeyed me, and elected 
" the Bishop of Oxford.' 

" Upon which they went directly to their 
" chappell, and Dr Pudsey proposing whether 
" they would obey the King and elect the Bishop, 
" they answered, every one in his order, they 
" were all very willing to obey his Majesty in all 
" things that lay in their power as any of the rest 
" of his Majesty's subjects ; but the electing of the 
" Bishop of Oxford being directly contrary to their 



PENN REMONSTKATES WITH THE KING. 53 

" statutes, and to the positive oath the j had taken, 
" thej could not apprehend it in their power to 
" obey him in this matter ; only Mr Dobson (who 
" had pubHcly prayed for Dr Hough, the un- 
" doubted President) answered doubtingly, he 
" was ready to obey in everything he could ; and 
" Mr Charrocke, a Papist, that he was for obey- 
" ing in that." i 

At this point begin the charges brought by 
Lord Macaulay against Penn with regard to this 
transaction. 

Penn had been with the King at Chester, and 
had accompanied him to Oxford. On the same 
day on which the angry interview between the 
King and the Fellows took place, Penn dined in 
company with Creech, one of the Fellows, who 
took the opportunity to have a long conversation 
with him regarding the affairs of the College. 
This appears from a letter written by Creech to 
Charlett, another Fellow, dated the 6th of Sep- 
tember. For anything that appears to the con- 
trary, this was the first occasion on which the 
affairs of the College were brought to the notice 
of Penn, who subsequently expressed to Hough 

■^ state-Paper Office, Domestic, James II., 1687, No. 4. 



54 PENN REMONSTRATES WITH THE KING 

his regret that he had not concerned himself 
about them at an earher period ; ^ and it was 
unquestionably in the character of a mediator 
with the King that he acted ; for, on the follow- 
ing day (Monday, the 5th of September), he went 
to the College, and, after hearing from the Fel- 
lows a statement of their case, he wrote to the 
King, remonstrating with him in bold language, and 
representing the inconsistency of his conduct with 
the professions of his Declaration of Indulgence. 
Lord Macaulay delights to sneer at Penn as a 
" courtly Quaker." Who but Penn would have 
been bold enough to face James in the very 
moment of his wrath, and to tell him unpala- 
table truths '? With regard to this part of the 
transaction the evidence is abundant and unex- 
ceptionable. The following passages, which 
occur in letters addressed at the time by Creech 
and Sykes, two of the Fellows, to Charlett, 
who was absent, are conclusive. The origi- 
nals are preserved in Dr Ballard's collection 
of Letters at Oxford, and they have been printed 
in the Athenceum Magazine for April and 
May 1809. 

' Hough's Letter, 2^ost. 



ON BEHALF OF THE FELLOWS. 55 

" On Monday morning, Mr Penn, the Quaker 
" (with whom I dined the day before, and had a 
" long discourse concerning the College), wrote a 
" letter to the King in their behalf, intimating 
" that such mandates were a force on conscience, 
" and not very agreeable to his other gracious 
" indulgences/' — Creech to Charlett, Sep- 
tember 6, 1687 ; AtliencEum, May 1809, 

" On Monday morning Mr Penn rode down 
" to Magdalen College just before he left this 
" place, and after some discourse with some of 
" the Fellows, wrote a short letter, directed to 
" the King. In it, in short, he wrote to this 
" purpose, that their case was hard, and that in 
" their circumstances they could not yield obe- 
" dience without a breach of their oaths ; which 
" letter was delivered to the King. I cannot 
" learn whether he did this upon his own free 
" motion or by command, or intercession of any 
" other." — Sykes to Charlett, September 7, 
1687; A thenceum Magazine, April 1809. 

'* The discourse that Penn had with some 
" of the Fellows of Magdalen CoUege, and 



56 LOED macaulay's account of 

" the letter mentioned in mj last, produced a 
" petition, whicli was subscribed bj all the Fel- 
" lows, and given to mj Lord Sunderland, who 
" promised to present it to the King." — Same to 
Same, September 9, 1687. 

Such is the account given bj the Fellows of 
Magdalen themselves in the freedom and con- 
fidence of correspondence with each other. It 
is clear that thej regarded Penn in the light of 
a mediator with the King ; that it was at their 
instance he interfered in the matter ; that his 
letter to the King was written at their request, 
and with their full knowledge, sanction, and ap- 
proval ; that their petition was founded upon it ; 
and, as one of them, Dr Baily, afterwards ex- 
pressed it, thej felt that Penn "appeared in 
" their behalf," and that he " employed much of 
" his time in doing good to mankind, and used 
" his credit with the King to undeceive him in 
" any wrong opinions given him of his conscien- 
" tious subjects." ^ 

We now come to Lord Macaulay's account of 
the same transaction. 

1 St. Tr., vol. xii. p. 22. 



THE king's defeat. 57 

" The King, greatly incensed and mortified by 
" his defeat, quitted Oxford and rejoined the 
" Queen at Bath. His obstinacy and violence 
" had brought him into an embarrassing position. 
" He had trusted too much to the effect of his 
" frowns and angry tones, and had rashly staked, 
" not merely the credit of his administration, 
" but his personal dignity, on the issue of the 
" contest. Could he yield to subjects whom he 
" had menaced with raised Yoice and furious ges- 
" tures 1 Yet could he venture to eject in one 
" day a crowd of respectable clergymen from 
" their homes, because they had discharged what 
" the whole nation regarded as a sacred duty. 
" Perhaps there might be an escape from the 
" dilemma ; perhaps the College might still be 
" terrified, caressed, or bribed into submission. 
" The agency of Penn was employed"^ 

This is the first of the several distinct per- 
versions of the facts in the narrative given by 
Lord Macaulay of this transaction. 

It is painful to be compelled to use expressions 
so strong, but the English language contains none 

1 Vol. ii. p. 298 ; vol. iii. p. 29, edit. 1858. 



58 LORD MAC AUL ay's PERVEESIONS OF FACTS : 

less severe bj which the statements of Lord 
Macaiilay can be truly designated. 

The memorandum in the State-Paper Office 
fixes the interview between the King and the 
Fellows as having taken place on the Sunday 
before the 9th of September 1687 — i. e. Sunday 
the 4th of September. Creech's letter to Char- 
lett is dated the 6th September. He speaks of 
Penn's letter of remonstrance to the King on 
behalf of the Fellows as having been written 
" on Monday morning." Sykes, writing on the 
7th of September, uses the same expression, and 
says that it was written "just before he^ left" 
Oxford, and "after some discussion with the 
" Fellows." This letter produced, he says, the 
petition to the King, which was signed by all 
the Fellows. The sequence of events is thus 
proved to have been as follows : — On Saturday 
the 3d September, the King came to Oxford ;^ 
on Sunday the 4th he sent for the Fellows of 
Magdalen, and had the angry interview with 
them.^ On the afternoon of the same day Creech 
dined with Penn, " had a long discourse con- 
" cerning the College," and no doubt solicited his 

^ i. e. Penn. ^ ji^te, p. 50. ^ Ante, p. 50. 



HIS CONFUSION OF DATES, 59 

good offices on its behalf/ On Monday the 5th ^ 
Penn went to the College, had a conversation 
with the Fellows, and wrote a letter on their 
behalf to the King, remonstrating with him on the 
injustice of his proceedings, and the inconsistency 
of his conduct with his declaration for liberty 
of conscience. On the afternoon of the same 
day Penn left Oxford.^ 

With these plain facts and dates before him, 
Lord Macaulay ventures to assert that Penn was 
employed by the King to " terrify, caress, or 
" bribe " the Fellows into submission, and to 
represent this as having taken place after the 
King had " quitted Oxford and rejoined the 
" Queen at Bath,'' and in consequence of the 
reflections induced by the "embarrassing posi- 
" tion" in which he found himself. As may well 
be supposed. Lord Macaulay suppresses the fact 
of Penn's having written his letter of remon- 
strance to the King, and carefully avoids the 
citation of any authority. The thing chiefly to 
be wondered at is, that he should have ventured 
upon a statement so easily and so conclusively 
shown to be unfounded. 

^ Ante, p. 55. ^ Ante, p. 55. ^ Ante, p. 65. 



60 HIS SUPPRESSION OF EVIDENCE, AND 

Lord Macaulay then proceeds : " He" [?. e. 
Penn] " had too much good feeling to approve of 
" the violent and unjust proceedings of the Gov- 
" ernment, and even ventured to express part of 
" what he thought. James as usual was obstinate 
" in the wrong. The courtly Quaker therefore 
" did his best to seduce the College from the 
" path of right. He first tried intimidation. 
" Ruin, he said, impended over the society. The 
" King was highly incensed. The case might 
" be a hard one ; most people thought it so ; 
" but every child knew that his Majesty loved 
" to have his own way, and could not bear to be 
" thwarted. Penn, therefore, exhorted the Fel- 
" lows not to rely upon the goodness of their 
" cause, but to submit, or at least to tempo- 
'' rise." ' 

At this point Lord Macaulay inserts his sole 
attempt to produce evidence in support of his 
charge against Penn ; and of what does it consist '? 
An anonymous letter ! At the latter end of 
September or beginning of October 1687, Dr 
Baily, one of the Fellows of Magdalen, received 
an anonymous letter, which, " from its charitable 

1 Vol. ii. p. 298, edit. 1858 ; iii. 30. 



EELIANCE ON AN ANONYMOUS LETTEE. 61 

" purpose," ^ he conjectured might come from 
Penn. Baily, as it turned out, was wrong in his 
conjecture, for, upon inquiry, Penn declared that 
it was not his.^ 

Lord Macaulaj asserts that " the evidence 
" which proves the letter to be his is irresist- 
" ible."3 

It may with far more truth be said that there 
is not one particle of evidence to that effect. 
Lord Macaulay asserts that Penn did not deny 
that it was his. Penn did deny that it was his, 
and his denial is recorded by those to whom it 
was made, and whose interests it concerned. "* 
This fact, though brought expressly to Lord 
Macaulay's knowledge, he fails to notice, and 
relies as evidence (!) on the circumstance that 
after years had elapsed, after Penn had left Eng- 
land for America, and returned, his mind filled 
with political anxieties, and his heart torn by 

^ Baily's Letter, xii. St. Tr., in Hunt's hand in the margin 

22. of this letter, the words, ' this 

2 Hunt MS., fo. 45, Mag. Col., letter Mr Penn disowned.' " 
Oxford ; cited Dixon's Life of Dixon's Life of Perm, edition 
Penn, edit. 1856, xxvii. 1851, A55, citing the Hunt MSS. 

3 Edit. 1858, iii. 30. in Magdalen College. Hunt 
* " The contemporary account was one of the Fellows at the 

of these proceedings, has written time. 



62 HIS AVOIDANCE OF DATES, 

domestic afflictions, he either did not know that 
this letter had been attributed to him in two or 
three publications, or did not think it worth while 
to contradict the misstatement. This Lord Mac- 
aulay calls " irresistible " evidence to prove the 
letter his 1 

Not only is there no evidence to show that 
Penn wrote this letter, but it is impossible to 
suggest any motive which could induce him to 
write anonymously. If he wished to produce 
any effect, he was certainly more likely to do so 
by using his name than by suppressing it. Even 
supposing the letter were written by Penn, it in 
no way supports Lord Macaulay's statement ; 
nor does it in any way refer to the interview at 
Oxford.^ 

After some comment on the counsel which 

^ The anonymous letter will devised to avert his anger, and 

be found printed at length in avoid the ruin which was im- 

the 12th vol. of the St. Tr. 21. pending over the College, the 

After some complimentary ex- overthrow of which " would be 

pressions with regard to Dr a fair beginning of so much 

Baily, to whom it was addressed, aimed at reformation, first of 

and an assurance of his good- the University, then of the 

will to the College, the writer Church, and administer such an 

proceeds to urge a compliance opportunity to the enemy as 

with the wishes of the King, or may not perhaps occur in his 

that some expedient should be Majesty's reign." 



AND INEXTEICABLE CONFUSION. 63 

Penn certainly did not give, Lord Macaulaj pro- 
ceeds : " Then Penn tried a gentler tone. He 
" had an interview with Hough, and with some 
" of the Fellows, and, after many professions of 
" sympathy and friendship, began to hint at a 
" compromise." 

Lord Macaulay carefully avoids dates. Penn 
had two interviews — the first with the Fellows 
at Magdalen on the 5th of September, and the 
second with Dr Hough, and Hamond, Hunt, 
Cradock, and Young, four of the Fellows, at 
Windsor, on the 9th of October following. Lord 
Macaulay in his narrative mixes these two inter- 
views, and the contents of the anonymous letter 
addressed to Baily, all up together, until the con- 
fusion he produces is utterly inextricable. 

As we have the testimony of Creech and Sykes 
for the first of those two interviews, we have 
that of Dr Hough for what took place at the 
last. It is the only evidence of any kind in ex- 
istence, and, making allowance for the pardon- 
able spleen which the haughty churchman ap- 
pears to have felt at being obliged to seek the 
favour of a Papist through the mediation of a 
Quaker, and his disgust at being compelled to 



64 DE hough's NAEKATIVE : 

listen in silence to a doctrine so discordant to 
his feelings, as that others than those who be- 
longed to his communion should be permitted to 
" give their children a learned education/' it is 
probably tolerably accurate. At any rate, it is 
the only evidence we have, and it is more trust- 
worthy than Lord Macaulay's paraphrase. 

Hough's account is contained in a letter writ- 
ten on the evening of the day when the inter- 
view took place, and is as follows : — 

" October the 9th, at night. 

" Deae Cousm, — I gave you a short account 
" of what passed at Windsor this morning, but 
" having the convenience of sending this by Mr 
" Charlett, I fancy you will be well enough sa- 
'' tisfied to hear our discourse with Mr Penn 
" more at large. 

" He was, in all, about three hours in our 
" company, and, at his first coming in, he began 
" with the great concern he had for the welfare 
" of our College, the many efforts he had made 
" to reconcile us to the King, and the great sin- 
" cerity of his intentions and actions ; that he 
" thought nothing in this world was worth a 



HIS LETTEE CONTAmiNG 65 

" trick, or anything sufficient to justify collusion 
" or deceitful artifice ; and this he insisted so 
" long upon, that I easily perceived he expected 
" something of a compliment by way of assent 
" should be returned ; and therefore, though I 
" had much ado to bring it out, I told him that, 
" whatever others might conceive of him, he 
" might be assured we depended upon his since- 
" rity, otherwise we would never have given our- 
" selves the trouble to come thither to meet him. 

" He then gave an historical account in short 
" of his acquaintance with the King ; assured 
" us it was not Popery, but property, that first 
" began it ; that, however people were pleased 
" to call him Papist, he declared to us that he 
" was a dissenting Protestant ; that he dissented 
" from Papists in almost all those points wherein 
" we differ from them, and many wherein we and 
" they are agreed. 

" After this we came to the College again. 
" He wished with all his heart he had sooner 
" concerned himself in it, but he was afraid that 
" he now came too late ; however, he would use 
" his endeavours, and if they were unsuccessful, 
" we must refer it to want of power, not of good- 

E 



QQ AN ACCOUNT OF 

" will to serve us. I told him I thought the 
" most effectual way would be, to give His Ma- 
" jest J a true state of the case, which I had 
" reason to suspect he had never yet received ; 
" and therefore I offered him some papers for 
" his instruction, whereof one was a copy of our 
" first petition before the election ; another was 
" our letter to the Duke of Ormond, and the state 
" of our case ; a third was that petition which 
" our Society had offered to His Majesty here at 
" Oxford ; and a fourth was that sent after the 
" King to Bath. He seemed to read them very 
" attentively, and, after many objections (to 
" which he owned I gave him satisfactory an- 
" swers), he promised faithfully to read every 
" word to the King, unless he was peremptorily 
" commanded to forbear. He was very solicit- 
" ous to clear Lord Sunderland, and throw the 
" odium upon the" Chancellor ; which I think I 
" told you in the morning, and which makes me 
" think there is little good to be hoped for from 
" him. 

" He said the measures now resolved upon 
*' were such as the King thought would take 
" ejffect ; but he said he knew nothing in parti- 



THE INTEEVIEW BETWEEN 67 

" ciilar, nor did he give the least light, or let 
" fall anything wheron we miglit so much as 
" ground a conjecture, nor did he so much as 
" hint at the letter which was sent to him. 

" I thank God he did not so much as offer at 
" any proposal by way of accommodation, which 
" was the thing I most dreaded ; only once, 
" upon the mention of the Bishop of Oxford's 
" indisposition, he said, smiling, ' If the Bishop 
" of Oxford die, Dr Hough may be made bishop. 
" What think you of that, gentlemen 1 ' Mr 
" Cradock answered, they should be heartily 
" glad of it, for it would do very well with the 
" presidentship. But I told him seriously * I 
" had no ambition above the post in which I 
" was ; and that having never been conscious to 
" myself of any disloyalty towards my prince, I 
" could not but wonder what it was should make 
" me so much more incapable of serving His 
" Majesty in it than those whom he had been 
" pleased to recommend.' He said, ' Majesty 
" did not love to be thwarted ; and after so long 
" a dispute, we could not expect to be restored 
" to the King's favour without making some con- 
" cessions.' I told him, ' that we were ready to 



68 

" make all that were consistent with honesty and 
" conscience/ But many things might have been 
" said upon that subject which I did not then 
" think proper to mention. ' However/ said I, 
" ' Mr Penn, in this I will be plain with you, we 
" have our statutes and oaths to justify us in all 
" we have done hitherto ; but, setting this aside, 
" we have a religion to defend ; and I suppose 
" yourself would think us knaves if we should 
" tamely give it up. The Papists have already 
" gotten Christ Church and University ; the pre- 
" sent struggle is for Magdalen ; and in a short 
" time, they threaten us, they will have the rest.' 
" He repKed with vehemence, ' That they shall 
" never have, assure yourselves. If they once 
" proceed so far, they will quickly find them- 
" selves destitute of their present assistance. 
" For my part, I have always declared my opinion 
" that the preferments of the Church should not 
" be put into any otlier hands but such as they 
" are at present in ; but I hope you would 
" not have the two Universities such invincible 
'' bulwarks for the Church of England that none 
" but they must be capable of giving their chil- 
" dren a learned education. I suppose two or 



AND THE FELLOWS AT WINDSOE. 69 

" three Colleges will content the Papists. Christ 
" Church is a noble structure, University is a 
" pleasant place, and Magdalen College is a 
" comely building. The walks are pleasant, and 
" it is conveniently situated, just at the entrance 
" of the town,' &c. &c. When I heard him talk 
" at this rate, I concluded he was either off his 
" guard, or had a mind to be droll upon us. 
" ' However,' I replied, ' when they had ours, 
" they would take the rest, as they and the 
" present possessors could never agree.' In 
" short, I see it is resolved that the Papists 
" must have our College, and I think all we 
" have to do is to let the world see that they 
" TAKE it from us, and that we do not give it 
*' up. 

" I count it great good fortune that so many 
" were present at this discourse (whereof I have 
" not told you a sixth part, but I think the 
" most considerable) ; for otherwise I doubt this 
" last passage would have been suspected, as if 
" to heighten their courage through despair. But 
" there was not a word said in private — Mr 
" Hammond, Mr Hunt, Mr Cradock, and Mr 
" Young being present all the time. 



70 LORD MACAULAY'S PARAPHRASE 

" Give my most humble service to Sir Thomas 
" Powell and Mrs Powell. 

" I am, dear Sir, yom^ very affectionate and 
'' faithful servant, — J. H." ^ 

Such is Hough's narrative : Lord Macaulay's 
paraphrase is as follows : — 

" Then Penn tried a gentler tone. He had an 
" interview with some of the Fellows, and, after 
" many professions of sympathy and friendship, 
" began to hint at a compromise. The King 
" could not bear to be crossed ; the College 
" must give way ; Parker must be admitted ; 
" but he was in very bad healtli ; all his pre- 
" ferments would soon be vacant. ' Dr Hough,' 
" said Penn, 'may then be Bishop of Oxford. 
" How should you like that, gentlemen T Penn 
" had passed his life in declaiming against a hire- 
" ling ministry. He held that he was bound to 
" refuse the payment of tythes, and this even 
" when he had bought land chargeable with 
" tythes, and had been allowed the value of the 
" tythes in the purchase-money. According to 
" his own principles, he would have committed a 

J Life of Hoiujh, p. 25. 



OF hough's naeeative. 71 

" great sin if he had interfered for the piir- 
" pose of obtaining a benefice on the most honour- 
" able terms for the most pious divine. Yet to 
" such a degree had his manners been corrupted 
" bj evil communication, and his understanding 
" obscured bj inordinate zeal for a single object, 
" that he did not scruple to become a broker in 
" simonj of a peculiarly discreditable kind, and 
" to use a bishopric as a bait to tempt a divine 
" to perjury. Hough replied, with civil con- 
" tempt, that he wanted nothing from the Crown 
" but common justice. * We stand,^ he said, 'upon 
" our statutes and our oaths; but even setting 
" aside our statutes and our oaths, we feel we have 
" a religion to defend.' " — [They had the rich 
revenues of Magdalen College to defend too, and 
they were quite right to defend them.] — " ' The 
" Papists have robbed us of University College ; 
" they have robbed us of Christ Church. The 
" fight now is for Magdalen. They will soon 
" have all the rest.' Penn was foolish enough 
" to answer that he really believed that the 
" Papists would now be content. ' University,' 
" he said, ' is a pleasant College ; Christ Church 
" is a noble place ; Magdalen is a fine building ; 
" the situation is convenient ; the walks by the 



72 LOED MACAULAY'S PAEAPHEASE 

" river are delightful. If the Roman Catholics 
** are reasonable, thej will be satisfied with 
" these/ This absurd avowal would alone have 
*' made it impossible for Hough and his brethren 
" to yield. The negotiation was broken off, and 
" the King hastened to make the disobedient 
" know, as he had threatened, what it was to 
" incur his displeasure." ^ 

Every one has heard of the client who burst 
into tears at the recital given by his counsel of 
the wrongs he had suffered, and declared that, 
until that moment, he had not the slightest idea 
how ill he had been used. Such is the case with 
Dr Hough. He had not the most remote 
notion that he was tempted to commit either 
simony or perjury. He emphatically " thanks 
"God" that Penn "did not so much as offer at 
" any proposal by way of accommodation."^ He 
never suspected Penn to be a " broker in sim- 
" ony ; " that he was using " a bishopric as a bait 

1 Mac. edit. 1858, iii. 31-33. Genesis, vii. 23 ; xlvii. 20, 22. 

2 Lord Macaulay argues that It hardly required so high an 
" the latter part of the sentence" authority to prove the general 
[in Hough's letter] " limits the proposition that the latter part 
general assertion contained in of a sentence may limit the for- 
the former part," * and cites mer. But, applied to the case 



Vol. iii. 32, note: 1858. 



OF hough's naerative. 73 

" to tempt a divine to perjury." Penn angled 
so skilfully, that lie not only concealed the hook, 
but the bait also ! It was left for Lord Mac- 
aulay, more than a century and a half after the 
events had taken place, to discover all this vil- 
lany, when neither Hough, nor Sykes, nor Char- 
lett, nor Hammond, nor Hunt, nor Craddock, 
nor Young, who had their wits sharpened by the 
sense of wrong, by their aversion to a Quaker, 
and their hatred of a Papist — nor any other 
mortal man who had anything to do with the 
transaction — ever so much as suspected it. 

Lord Macaulay, who knows more of what 
Kiffin did and said than Kiffin himself, is gifted 
with a like penetration as to Hough. Neither 
is to be trusted to tell his own story ; but the 
reverse of what each asserts is to be accepted 
as the narrative sanctioned by his authority. 
Such is History in the hands of Lord Macaulay ! 



in question, Lord. Macaulay' s ar- the thing he most dreaded" had 

gument involves the absvirdity not happened, only for the pur- 

that Hough must be supposed pose of immediately afterwards 

to have made the most solemn saying it had happened ! To 

and emphatic assertion of a fact, suppose that a man of Hough's 

only for the purpose of directly intelligence should commit these 

contradicting himself in the next absurdities, only shows to what 

line — to have in the most dis- straits Lord Macaulay is re- 

tinot language stated, that " the duced to support his statement. 



V. 



We shall now have to regard Peiin from a 
different point of view. 

Hitherto he has appeared as the personal 
friend of the King. Whilst peers and privj 
councillors stood in the anteroom, he was ad- 
mitted to the privacy of the rojal closet. He 
was the messenger of pardon and mercy ; his 
word opened the prison doors ; his abode was 
thronged by suppliants ; and his steps were fol- 
lowed by blessings. He had obtained for Locke 
(" the most illustrious and most grossly injured 
" man amongst the British exiles " ^) permission 
to return to his native land,^ and even had 
influence sufficient to recall from banishment 
a man so obnoxious as Trenchard. ^ He had 
established a Commonwealth across the Atlantic, 



1 Mac, vol. ii. p. 122 ; 1858. ^ Dixon's Life of Penn, p. 

2 Dixon's Life of Penn, p. 292, 322. Mac. iv. 372. Lawton's 
edit. 1851, and the authorities Memoir. Janney's Life of 
there cited. Penn, 301. 



POSITION OF PENN IN 1688. 75 

on the basis of perfect religious freedom, and 
had urged the adoption of the same principle at 
home. He had remonstrated against the uncon- 
stitutional powers assumed bj the King in his 
declaration for freedom of conscience. He had 
opposed the proceedings against the bishops, 
and uro-ed the Kinoj to avail himself of the occa- 
sion of the birth of the Prince of Wales to set 
them at liberty.^ His was the only tongue bold 
enough to tell unwelcome truths to his sove- 
reign ; and it is some satisfaction to find, that 
among the many dark blots which stain the char- 
acter of James, he appears never to have visited 
this brave and faithful servant with his displea- 
sure. Such was the position of William Penn 
at the close of the year 1688. But the day was 
rapidly approaching when all this was to change. 
For the next three years he was to find himself 
the object of the most unrelenting and vexatious 
persecution. 

On the morning of the 11th December 1688, 
the King fled from London. ^ 

Penn, walking in Whitehall, was immediately 

^ See Lawto-s' 8 Memoir. Jan- ^ Ellis Cor. ii. 345, 
net's Life of Penn, 307. 



76 penn's letter to 

arrested, and brought before the Lords of the 
Council, who were then sitting ;^ but no charge 
was made, and he was set at liberty on giving 
bail to the amount of £6000 for his appearance. 
He was not, however, allowed to remain long at 
peace ; for, on the 27th of February following, 
a warrant was issued for his arrest.^ Penn 
immediately wrote to Lord Shrewsbury,*^ as fol- 
lows : — 

" I thought it would look rather foolish than 
" innocent, to take any notice of popular fame ; 
" but so soon as I could inform myself that a 
" warrant was out against me (which I knew 
" not till this morning), it seemed to me a re- 
" spect due to the Government, as well as a 
" justice to myself, to make this address, that so 
" my silence might neither look like fear nor 
" contempt ; for as my conscience forbids the 
" one, the sense I have of my duty will not let 
" me be guilty of the other. 

" That which I have humbly to offer is this : 



1 Besse, 139. Ellis Cor. ii. ^ Penn to Lord Shrewsbury, 
356, Dec. 13,1688. Mar. (1st mo.) 1689. Janney's 

2 Pro. Co. Eeg. Feb. 27, 1688-9. Life of Penn, 353. 



LORD SHEEWSBUEY. 77 

" I do profess solemnly, in the presence of God, 
" I have no hand or share m any consph'acy 
" against the King or Government, nor do I 
" know any that have ; and this I can affirm 
" without directing my intention equivocally. 
" And though I have the unhappiness of being 
" very much misunderstood in my principles 
" and inclinations by some people, I thought I 
" had some reason to hope this King would not 
" easily take me for a plotter, to whom the last 
" Government always thought me too partial. 
" In the next place, as I have behaved myself 
" peaceably, I intend, by the help of God, to 
" continue to live so ; but being already under an 
" excessive bail (when no order or matter ap- 
" peared against me), and having, as is well known 
" to divers persons of good credit, affairs of great 
" importance to me and my family now in hand, 
" that require to be despatched for America, I 
" hope it will not be thought a crime that I do not 
" yield up myself an unavailable prisoner ; and 
" pray the King will please to give me leave to 
" continue to follow my concerns at my house in 
" the country ; which favour, as I seek it by the 
" Lord Shrewsbury's mediation, so I shall take 



78 THE FIFTH CHAEGE. 

" care to use it with discretion and thankful- 
" ness. 

" I am, his affectionate friend to serve him,-^ 

" Wm. Penn." 

We now come to Lord Macaulay's Fifth charge. 
It is contained in the following passage : — 

" The conduct of Penn was scarcely less scan- 
" dalous ; he was a zealous and busy Jacobite ; 
" and his new way of life was even more unfavour- 
" able than his late way of life had been to moral 
" purity. It was hardly possible to be at once a 
" consistent Quaker and a courtier ; but it was 
" utterly impossible to be at once a consistent 
" Quaker and a conspirator. It is melancholy 
" to relate that Penn, while professing to consider 
" even defensive war as sinful, did everything in 
" his power to bring a foreign army into the heart 
" of his own country. He wrote to inform James 
" that the adherents of the Prin<!e of Orange 
" dreaded nothing so much as an appeal to the 
" sword, and that if England were now invaded 
" from France or from Ireland, the number of 
" royalists would appear to be greater than ever. 
" Avaux thought this letter so important, that 



AVAUX'S LETTER TO LOUIS. 79 

" lie sent a translation of it to Louis. A good 
" effect, the shrewd ambassador wrote, had been 
" produced by this and similar communications 
" on the mind of King James : his Majesty was 
" at last convinced that he could recover his do- 
" minions only sword in hand. It is a curious 
" fact that it should have been reserved for the 
" great preacher of peace to produce this convic- 
" tion in the mind of the old tyrant." ^ 

This virulent attack Lord Macaulay attempts 
to justify by quoting a letter written by Avaux 
to Louis on the 5th of June 1689. It is the 
sole authority for the passage. Lord Macaulay 
justly observes, that " of the difference between 
" right and wrong, Avaux had no more notion 
" than a brute." ^ But even this very question- 
able witness does not say what Lord Macaulay 
puts into his mouth, nor anything approach- 
ing it. 

The license of translation which Lord Mac- 
aulay allows himself is something marvellous.^ 

Avaux, writing on the 5th of June 1689, 

1 Mac. iii. 587 ; v. 218 ; 1858. 1858. Barillon, writing on Sep- 

2 Vol. iii. p. 168. tember 6-1 6, 1687, says, referring 
^ An amusing instance is to to what was taking place in Ire- 
be found, p. 27, V. iii., edition land, " II reste encore beaucoup 



80 LOED MACAULAY'S LICENCE OP TEANSLATION. 

from Dublin, where James was then holding his 
court, informs Louis that important news had 
arrived from England and Scotland. He then 
proceeds : " Le commencement des nouvelles 
" datees d'Angleterre est la copie d'une lettre de 
" M. Pen que J'aj veue en original." Avaux, be 
it observed, says not one word from which it can 
be inferred that Penn's letter was addressed to 
James : it might or might not be addressed to 
him. We now come to the " Memoire" which 
accompanied the letter of Avaux. It begins 
w^ith tlie following words, which Lord Macaulay 
asserts " must have been part of Penn's letter." ^ 
" Le Prince d'Orange commence d'etre fort 
" degoutte de Fhumeur des Anglais ; et la face 
" des choses change bien viste selon la nature 
" des insulaires ; et sa sante est fort mauvaise." 

" de choses k faire en ce pays la " their property ; and this last 

" pour retirer les Mens injust- " outrage was deferred only 

" ment 6tes aux CatJwliques ; " until the co-operation of an 

" mais cella ne peut s'executer " Irish Parliament should have 

" qu'avec le terns et dans I'as- " been secured." So that, in 

" semblee d'un parlement en Lord Macaulay's opinion, re- 

" Irelande." Lord Macaulay stoinng to a Catholic what he 

paraphrases this passage as fol- had been unjustly robbed of, ne- 

lows : " The English colonists cessarily involves the stripping 

" had already been stripped of a Protestant of his property ! 

" all political power. Nothing ^ Vol. iii. p. 587 ; vol. v. p. 218 ; 

" remained but to strip them of 1858. 



POSITION OF AFFAIKS IN SCOTLAND. 81 

Here ends everything which, on the widest con- 
struction, can be attributed to Penn.^ The 
remainder of the paper relates to affairs in Scot- 
land (where Dundee was in arms at the head of 
the clans ^), the state of the navy and mercantile 
marine, and other matters, with which Penn had 
nothing whatever to do. But can even these 
words be, as Lord Macaulay asserts, "part of 
" Penn s letter 1 " Did one Englishman, writing 
to another, ever use such a phrase as " selon la 
" nature des insulaires," or any equivalent for it '? 
At most it is but the representation of Avaux 
(who was employing every argument in his power 
to induce Louis to send men and money to Ire- 
land) of the substance of Penn's communication. 
But assume that every word of the statement 
that is made by Avaux is true — admit that Penn 
wrote to some one that the Prince of Orange was 
disgusted with the temper of the English — that 
the appearance of affairs was changing, and that 
his health was bad : every word of this was 
true — every word was notorious ; and why should 
not Penn write it \ What is there "scandalous" 

1 The Letter of Avaux, and on's Life of Penn, ed. 1856, p, 
the " Memoire" accompanying xxxviii. 
it, are given at length in Dix- ^ Mac. iii. 342. 

F 



82 PENN OK DUNDEE? 

or " morally impure '? " What is there to justify 
the charge of being a " Conspirator," or of doing 
" everything in his power to bring a foreign army 
" into the heart of his country ? " Why should 
Penn be held up to execration for his attachment 
to James, when we regard Sarsfield as a hero, 
and almost forget the cruel and bloodthirsty 
Claverhouse in the faithful and chivalrous Dun- 
dee ? But the fact is, that it was not Penn, but 
Dundee, that was writing for troops. At this 
very time, in the months of May and June 1689, 
we find, from Lord Macaulay's own account, that 
Dundee was sending to Dublin " a succession of 
" letters earnestly imploring assistance. If six 
" thousand, four thousand, three thousand regular 
" soldiers were now sent to Lochaber, he trusted 
" that his Majesty would soon hold a Court at 
" Holyrood." ^ It is in reference to this circum- 
stance that Avaux says, in this same letter, to 
Louis : " Le Roy d'Angleterre a rosolu de faire 
" partir incessamment un secour de mille ou douze 
" cens hommes qu'il a dessein il y a deja quelque 
" temps d'envoyer en Ecosse.''^ This Lord Mac- 
aulay omits. It was Dundee, not Penn, that 

1 Mac, iii. 342. ^ Letter of Avaux to Louis. 



DUNDEE, NOT PENN. 83 

was " doing everything in his power to bring a 
" foreign army into the heart of his own country." 
It was by Dundee, not by Penn, that James was 
" convinced that he could recover his dominions 
" only sword in hand." It was not, as Lord Mac- 
aulay asserts, "reserved for the great Preacher 
" of Peace," but for the terrible Graham of Cla- 
verhouse, "to produce this conviction on the mind 
" of the old Tyrant." Nothing is so easy for 
an historian as to attribute to one man the acts 
and words of another — to put the counsels of 
Dundee into the mouth of Penn — to omit the 
document he refers to — and to leave his readers 
to accept the narrative without examination of 
the authorities — to receive his eloquent fiction as 
history — and to content themselves with marvel- 
ling at the inconsistency, and pitying the weak- 
ness, of human nature.^ 

^ After all, it is, to say the and Payne. It must be remem- 

least, doubtful, whether this bered that the whole charge 

letter was written by William rests on a Frenchman's ortho- 

Penn at all. It appears more graphy of an English surname, 

probable that the writer was Nevill Penn was the unhappy 

Nevill Penn, " one of the most man who was so barbarously 

adroit and resolute agents of tortured in Scotland the foUow- 

the exiled family." * His name iug year. See Appendix, IV., 

is spelt indifferently Penn, Pain, Letter of the Earl of Craufurd. 

* Mac. iii.682. 



VL 



The Sixth charge is contained in the follow- 
ing passage : ^ — 



" Among the letters which the Government 
" had intercepted was one from James to Penn. 
" That letter, indeed, was not legal evidence to 
" prove that the person to whom it was addressed 
" had been guilty of high treason ; but it raised 
" suspicions, which are now known to have been 
" well founded. Penn was brought before the 
" Privy Council and interrogated. He said, very 
" truly, that he could not prevent people from 
" writing to him, and that he was not accountable 
" for what they might write to him. He acknow- 
" ledged that he was bound to the late King by 
" ties of gratitude and affection, which no change 
" of fortune could dissolve. ' I should be glad to 
" to do him any service in his private affairs ; 

1 Macaulat, vol. iii. p. 599; v. 231 ; 1858. 



PASSAGE FROM CROESE QUOTED. 85 

" but I owe a sacred duty to my country, and 
" therefore I never was so wicked as ever to 
" think of endeavouring to bring him back/ 
" This was a falsehood, and William was proba- 
" bly aware that it was so. He was unwilling 
" however, to deal harshly with a man who had 
" many titles to respect, and who was not likely 
" to be a very formidable plotter. He therefore 
" declared himself satisfied, and proposed to dis- 
" charge the prisoner. Some of the Privy Coun- 
" cillors, however, remonstrated, and Penn was 
" required to give bail." 

Lord Macaulay cites " Gerard Croese" as his 
authority, but without giving page or date, or 
any guide whatever to the part of Croese on 
which he relies. The only passage which I have 
been able to discover in Croese bearing any re- 
semblance to Lord Macaulay's narrative, is the 
following : — 

" While public affairs were thus changed, W. 
" Penn was not so regarded and respected by 
" King and Court as he was formerly by King 
" James, partly because of his intimacy with 
" King James, and partly for adhering to his old 



86 ALLEGED FALSEHOOD 

" opinion concerning the Oath of Fidelity, which 
" was now mitigated, but not abrogated. Besides 
" this, it was suspected that Penn corresponded 
" with the late King, now lurking in France 
" under the umbrage and protection of the 
" French King, an enemy justly equally odious 
*' to the British King and the United Provinces, 
" 'twixt whom there was now an inveterate war. 
" This suspicion was followed, and also increased, 
" by a letter intercepted from King James to 
" Penn, desiring Penn to come to his assistance 
" in the present state and condition he was in, 
" and express the resentments of his favour and 
'' benevolence. Upon this, Penn, being cited to 
" appear, was asked why King James wrote unto 
" him. He answered, he could not hinder such a 
" thing. Being further questioned what resent- 
" ments there were which the late King seemed to 
" desire of him. He answered, he knew not ; but 
" said he supposed King James would have him 
" to endeavour his restitution, and that though 
" he could not decline the suspicion, yet he could 
" avoid the guilt. And since he had loved King 
" James in his prosperity, he should not hate 
" him in his adversity ; yea, he loved him as yet 



IN A SUPPOSED INTEEVIEW 87 

" for many favours he had conferred on him, 
" though he would not join with him in what 
" concerned the state of the kingdom. He owned 
" he had been much obliged to King James, and 
" that he would reward his kindness by any 
" private office as far as he could, observing 
" inviolably and entirely that duty to the publick 
*' and government which was equally incumbent 
" on all subjects, and therefore that he had never 
" the vanity to think of endeavouring to restore 
" him that crown which was fallen from his 
" head ; so that nothing in that letter could at 
" all serve to fix guilt upon him/' "^ 

It will be observed that the passage in Croese 
materially differs from that in Lord Macaulay. 
It was probably cited from memory, and it would 
appear that the narrative of Clarkson,^ who 
seems to have derived his information from 
Besse,^ was what was present to Lord Macaulay's 
mind. But it is unnecessary to go at length into 
this inquiry, for a little attention to dates and 
unquestionable documents will show that, though 
this interview between the King and Penn has 

I Croese, Book 2. p. 112. Old ^ Vol. ii. p. 69. 
Translation, London, 1696. ^ Vol. i. p. 140. 



88 WITH THE KING 

been repeated bj all the biographers of Penn, 
from Besse downwards, it is altogether apo- 
cryphal. 

Lord Macaulaj places this supposed inter- 
view in the spring or summer of 1690, imme- 
diately before the King's departure for Ireland, 
which took place on the 4th of June in that 
year.^ Mr Dixon, the biographer of Penn, 
places it at the same time,^ citing Besse, the 
author of the Life of Penn prefixed to his 
works, and published in 1726. The silence of 
Burnett, of whose intimate acquaintance with 
the transactions of this period there can be no 
more doubt than of the eagerness with which he 
would have recorded any circumstance deroga- 
tory to Penn, would alone be sufficient to excite 
suspicion. But the Registers of the Privy 
Council show that the proclamation for the 
arrest of Penn was not issued until the 24tli of 
June,^ nearly three weeks after the King had 
left London. After a careful search, I have not 
been able to discover any mention whatever of 



' Evelyn's Diary, iii. 294; ^ Bixo^s's Life of Penn, 340; 
Mac. iii. 600. 1851. 

3 P. C. Reg., 24th June 1690. 



WHICH NEVER 89 

Penn in those registers during any earlier part 
of the year 1690, nor was he actually in custody 
until some time later. 

On the 31st of July 1690, Penn wrote as fol- 
lows to the Earl of Nottingham : ^ — 

" My Noble Fkiend, — As soon as I heard 
'' my name was in the proclamation, I offered to 
" surrender myself, with those regards to a 
" broken health which I owe to myself and my 
" family ; for it is now six weeks that I have 
" laboured under the effect of a surfeit and re- 
" lapse, which was long before I knew of this 
" mark of the Government's displeasure. It is 
" not three days ago that I was fitter for a 
" bed than a surrender and a prison. I shall 
" not take up time about the hardships I am 
" under . . . But since the Government 
" does not think fit to trust me, I shall trust 
" it, and submit my conveniency to the State's 
" security and satisfaction. And, therefore, I 
" humbly beg to know when and where I shall 
" wait upon thee. — Thy faithful friend, Wm. 
" Penj^." 

1 Cited in Dixon's Life of Penn, 1851, 344. 



90 TOOK PLACE. 

On the 15th August he was brought up and 
discharged from custody/ 

William did not return from Ireland until 
September.^ 

It is unnecessary, therefore, to inquire how 
far the disgusting charge of falsehood (a charge 
which Lord Macaulay appears to have a remark- 
able aptitude for bringing) is supported by his 
narrative of a conversation which certainly did 
not take place. 

^ Pr. Co. Reg,, 15th August voyage of twenty-four hours, 

1690. landed at Bristol ; thence he tra- 

2 Mac. iii. 677. — ''On the 6th velledtoLondon, stopping at the 

of September, the King, after a mansions of some gi'eat lords." 



VII. AND VIII. 

We now come to the transactions of the 
year 1691. 

At the commencement of that year, Lord 
Preston and Ashton were tried and convicted 
for their well-known plot. Ashton was exe- 
cuted. Preston, urged by the terrors of death, 
and allured by the hopes of pardon, was in- 
duced to make a confession. Amongst others, 
he named Penn as having been concerned in 
his plot. There is not one particle of evi- 
dence to support this charge ; but Lord Macau- 
lay, without pausing to consider how infamous 
was the character of Preston, or the grave 
doubt thrown upon his confession by the mode 
in which it was obtained, assumes that it was 
true. 

A proclamation was issued for the arrest of 
Penn, the Bishop of Ely, and others.^ Lord 

1 Pr. Co. Reg., Feb. 5, 1690-91. 



92 FUNERAL OF GEOEGE FOX. 

Maeaulaj, again following the errors of the 
biographers of Penn, introduces a picturesque 
description of the attendance of Penn at the 
funeral of George Fox — of his conspicuous 
" appearance among the disciples who com- 
" mitted the yenerable corpse to the earth ;" 
— tells how, when the ceremony was scarcely 
finished, he heard that warrants were out 
against him — "how he instantly took flight ;" — 
how " he lay hid in London during some months," 
and then " stole down to the coast of Sussex, 
" and made his escape to France." ^ There is 
about as much foundation for this stirring nar- 
rative as for the incidents of an Adelphi melo- 
drama.^ 



^ Vol. iv. p. 30, 31 ; vi. 31, 32 ; captain in Europe. To his 

1858. corpse every honour was paid. 

^ Lord Macaulay's taste for The only cemetery in which so 

the picturesque occasionally illustrious a warrior, slain in 

leads him into errors, which, if arms for the liberties and reli- 

committed by another, he might gion of England, could properly 

designate by a more severe and be laid, was that venerable ab- 

shorter word. Schomberg fell bey, hallowed by the dust of 

at the Boyne, and Lord Macau- many generations of princes, 

lay thus records the honours heroes, and poets. It was an- 

paid to his corpse : — nounced that the brave veteran 

" The loss of the conquerors should have a public funeral at 

did not exceed 500 men; but Westminster. In the mean time 

amongst them was the first his_ corpse was embalmed with 



PENN S LETTER TO LLOYD. 



93 



Fox was buried on the 16th of January.^ 
Penn, giving an account of the funeral some 

such skill as could be found in an excuse they pretend they 

the camp, and was deposited in will send for his body, let them 

a leaden coffin." * know it is mine ; and rather 

The fact is, that Schomberg than send it, I will take up the 

was buried, not in Westminster bones and make of it a skeleton, 

Abbey, but in St Patrick's and put it in my Registry Office 

Cathedral, Dublin. So far from to be a memorial of their base- 

" every honour being paid to ness to all posterity." t 
his corpse," William left the Swift's application was in 

grave of "the first captain in vain, and in 1731 he carried 

Eui'ope" unmarked even by a part of his threat into execu- 

single line, and so it remained tion, and recorded the filial 

for forty years. impiety of the postei'ity of the 

In 1728, Swift, writing to Lord great Duke on a small monu- 
Carteret, says: ''The great mentj which he placed over his 
Duke of Schomberg is buried grave, not far from that on 
under the altar in my cathed- which a few years later he in- 
ral. ... I desire you will scribed the burning words that 
tell Lord F. that if he will not tell of the indignation at the 
send fifty pounds to make a baseness and ingratitude of man- 
monument for the old Duke, I kind which consumed his own 
and the Chapter will erect a heart. 

small one ourselves for ten Had the fortune of the war 
pounds; whereon it shall be been different — had James re- 
expressed that the posterity of gained his throne, and Sarsfield 
the Duke, naming particularly filled the grave of Schomberg — 
Lady Holderness and Mr Mild- with what glowing eloquence 
may, not having the generosity would Lord Macaulay have de- 
to erect a monument, we have nounced the ingratitude of the 
done it of ourselves ; and if for Tyrant ! 

* Mac. iii. 638, 1855 ; v. 271, 185S. 

t Swift to Lord Carteret, May 10, 1728. Vol. xvi. 122. 

* Swift's Works, vii. 382. 



^ Journal of G. Fox, by Armisted, App. 366. 



94 penn's letter to heney Sidney : 

montlis after, describes the large concourse of 
people wlio were present, sajs that he felt him- 
self easy and under no alarm, and " was never 
" more public than that day." He appears when 
he wrote this letter to have been imder the 
impression that the w^arrants had been issued 
earlier than they really were, and to have sup- 
posed that he had " very providentially" escaped 
a danger of which he had been unconscious, and 
to which in reality he had never been exposed.^ 
The proclamation for the arrest of Penn was not 
issued until the 5th February.^ He did not 
take to flight ; he never " stole down to 
" the coast of Sussex," nor did he " escape to 
" France." 

The conduct of Penn was precisely what 
might be expected from a bold, honest, but 
prudent man. As on a former occasion he wrote 
to Lord Nottingham, so he now addressed him- 
self to Henry Sidney.^ 

Henry Sidney was the younger brother of 
Penn's friend Algernon Sidney, but shared 

1 Penn to Lloyd, 14th of 4 til ^ p^iyy Counqil Reg., 5tli 

mo. (i.e. June, Penn making use February 1690-91. 

of the old style) 1691.— Jan- ^ ^^^^ ^^^ 30^ 
net's Life of Penn, 369. 



SEEKS AN INTEEVIEW WITH HIM. 95 

little of bis character. Penn had known him 
from boyhood. He stood high in the favour of 
William. -^ To him Penn wrote, earnestly deny- 
ing any participation in the plot, or knowledge 
of the designs of the conspirators. 

" Let it be enough, I say, and that truly, I 
" know of no invasions or insurrections — men, 
" money, or arms for them — or any juncto, or 
" consult for advice, or corresponding in order 
" to it ; nor have I ever met with those named 
" as the members of this conspiracy, or prepared 
" any measures with them. . . Noble friend, 
" suffer not the King to be abused by lies to my 
" ruin. My enemies are none of his friends. I 
" plainly see the design of the guilty is to make 
" me so ; and the most guilty thinking dirt will 
" best stick on me, to which old grutches, as well 
" as personal conveniences to others, help not a 
"little." 2 

Nor did Penn confine himself to writing ; he 
sought a personal interview with Sidney, at 
which he repeated liis assurance of his hav- 
ing no share in any plot or conspiracy. Lord 

1 Burnett, iv. 8. 

2 Penn to Henry Sidney, Janney's Life of Penn, 369, 



96 HENEY Sidney's lettee 

Macaulay calls Penn's application to Sidney a 
" strange communication/'^ 

What there was strange in it does not appear 
very clearly ; and certainly Sidney felt, or at any 
rate expressed, no surprise. It will be seen from 
the following letter that Sidney must have re- 
ceived this communication from Penn within less 
than a fortnight after the issue of the procla- 
mation. 

Sidney's letter, addressed to William, who was 
then at the Hague, is as follows : — 

''Feh. 27, 1690-1. 

"Sir, — About ten days ago, Mr Penn sent 
" his brother-in-law, Mr Lowther, to me, to let me 
" know that he would be very glad to see me if 
" I would give him leave, and promise him to 
" let him return without being molested. I sent 
" him word I would if the Queen would permit 
" it. He then desired me not to mention it to 
" any one but the Queen. I said I would not. 
" On Monday he sent to me to know what time 
" I would appoint. I named Wednesday, in the 
" evening; and accordingly I went to the place 

1 Mac. iv. 30; vi. 31; 1858. 



TO KING WILLIAM. 97 

" at the time, where I found him, just as he 
" used to be, not at all disguised, but in the 
" same clothes and the same humour I formerly 
" have seen him in. It would be too long for 
" jour Majesty to read a full account of all our 
" discourse ; but, in short, it was this, that he 
" was a true and faithful servant to King William 
" and Queen Mary, and if he knew anything 
" that was prejudicial to them or their Govern- 
" ment, he would readily discover it. He pro- 
" tested, in the presence of God, that he knew 
" of no plot ; nor did he beHeve there was any 
" one in Europe but what King Lewis hath laid ; 
" and he was of opinion that King James knew 
" the bottom of this plot as little as other people. 
" He saith he knows your Majesty hath a great 
" many enemies; and some that came over with 
" you, and some that joined you soon after your 
" arrival, he was sure were more inveterate and 
" more dangerous than the Jacobites ; for he saith 
" there is not one man among them that hath 
" common understanding. 

" To the letters that were found with my Lord 
" Preston, and the paper of the conference, he 
" would not give any positive answer, but said if 

G 



98 AT THE HAGUE. 

" he could have the honour to see the King, and 
" that he would be pleased to believe the sin- 
*' cerity of what he saith, and pardon the inge- 
" nuitj of what he confessed, he would freely tell 
" everything he knew of himself, and other things 
" that would be much for his Majesty's service 
" and interest to know ; but if he cannot obtain 
" this favour, he must be obliged to quit the 
" kingdom, which he is very unwilling to do. 
"He saith he might have gone away twenty 
" times if he had pleased, but he is so confident 
" of giving your Majesty satisfaction if you would 
" hear him, that he was resolved to expect your 
" return before he took any sort of measures. 
" What he intends to do is all he can do for your 
" service, for he can't be a witness if he would, it 
" being, as he saith, against his conscience and 
" his principles to take an oath. This is the 
" sum of our conference. I am sure your Ma- 
" jesty will judge as you ought to do of it, with- 
" out any of my reflections." ^ 

Such is Sidney's letter. Now for Lord Mac- 
aulay's paraplirase : — 

" A short time after his disappearance, Sidney 

^ Dal. ii. Appen. 183. 



LORD MACAULAY'S PARAPHEASE. 99 

" received from him a strange communication. 
'* Penn begged for an interview, but insisted on 
" a promise that he should be suffered to return 
" unmolested to his hiding-place. Sidney ob- 
'• tained the royal permission to make an appoint- 
" ment on these terms. Penn came to the ren- 
" dezvous, and spoke at length in his own defence. 
" He declared that he was a faithful subject of 
" King William and Queen Mary, and that if he 
" knew of any design against them he would 
" discover it. Departing from his Yea and Nay, 
" he protested, as in the presence of God, that 
" he knew of no plot, and that he did not believe 
" that there was any plot, unless the ambitious 
" projects of the French Government might be 
" called plots. Sidney, amazed probably by 
" hearing a person who had such an abhorrence 
" of lies that he would not use the common forms 
'' of civility, and such an abhorrence of oaths 
" that he would not kiss the book in a court of 
" justice, tell something very like a lie, and con- 
" firm it by something very like an oath — asked 
" how, if there were really no plot, the letters 
" and minutes which had been found upon Ash- 
" ton were to be explained. This question Penn 



100 



" evaded. ' If/ he said, ' I could only see the 
" King, I would confess everything to him 
" freely. I would tell him much that it would 
" be important for him to know. It is only in 
" that way that I can be of service to him. A 
" witness for the Crown I cannot be, for my 
" conscience will not suffer me to be sworn.' 
" He assured Sidney that the most formidable 
" enemies of the Government were the discon- 
" tented Whigs. ' The Jacobites are not danger- 
" ous. There is not a man amonsfst them who 
" has common understanding. Some persons 
" who came over from Holland with the King 
" are much more to be dreaded.' It does not 
" appear that Penn mentioned any names. He 
" was suffered to depart in safety. No active 
" search was made for him. He lay hid in Lon- 
" don during some months, and then stole down 
" to the coast of Sussex, and made his escape to 
" France." ^ 

Here we find the hand of the accomplished 
artist. One of the most able of the political 
caricatures of Gilray, entitled Doublures of 
Character, contains portraits of Fox, Sheridan, 

^Mac. iv. 30; vi. 32; 1858. 



LORD MACAULAY's MISQUOTATIONS. 101 

and several other leading Whigs. Beside each 
head is a repetition so slightly altered that the 
change is hardly perceptible, yet so skilfully and 
so completely, that Fox is converted into the 
arch-fiend, Sheridan into Judas Iscariot, Sir 
Francis Burdett into Sixteen-string Jack, the 
Duke of Norfolk into Silenus, and Lord DerlDy 
into a baboon. Such is Lord Macaulay s treat- 
ment of Sidney's letter. Sidney expresses no 
amazement ; he never intimates that he con- 
sidered Penn's statement to be " something very 
" like a lie." Lord Macaulay asserts that Penn 
said, " If I could only see tlie King I would 
" confess everything to him freely." Sidney's 
statement is that Penn said, " if he could have 
" the honour to see the King, and that he would 
" be pleased to believe the sincerity of what he 
'' said, and pardon the ingenuity [ingenuous- 
" ness] of what he confessed, he would freely 
" tell everything he knew of himself, and other 
*' things that would be much for his Majesty's 
" service and interest to know." 

The two statements are widely different. Lord 
Macaulay 's implies that Penn had some crime to 
confess ; Sidney's amounts to no more than 



102 FEOM Sidney's letter. 

that Penn would give all information in his 
power, if he could be allowed to do so directly 
to the King. And without going the length of 
Swift, who describes Henrj Sidney as " an idle, 
" drunken, ignorant rake, without sense, truth, 
" or honour," 1 it may well be that Penn did not 
choose to make him the channel of communication 
for all that he might be disposed to trust to the 
King himself. In his account of this interview, 
Lord Macaulay marks two passages with inverted 
commas, as if they formed part of the docu- 
ment he is quoting. The passages which occur 
in Sidney's letter are widely different, as will be 
seen by a comparison of the two. Does Lord 
Macaulay consider this " emphatically honest 1 " 
No one knows better than he does that not one 
in ten thousand of his readers will refer to Dal- 
rymple's Appendix to test his accuracy, or sus- 
pect him of passing off his own paraphrase as 
the copy of an original document. 

Lord Macaulay proceeds : " He lay hid in 
" London during some months, and then stole 
" down to the coast of Sussex and made his 
" escape to France." 

^ Burnett, iii. 264, note. 



lutteell's diary. 103 

For this assertion Lord Macaulaj cites Liit- 
trelFs Diary, September 1691. Luttrell is a 
favourite authority with Lord Macaulay, who 
cites his Diary as if it deserved similar credit 
with those of Evelyn and Clarendon. At the 
time of the publication of Lord Macaulay's His- 
tory, LuttrelFs Diary remained in manuscript, 
and a certain mysterious value was attached to 
it. It has since been published, and a mass of 
duller and more contemptible rubbish never 
appeared in six handsome octavo volumes. Of 
Luttrell himself little is known, except that he 
was a book collector, and died in 1732; that 
he was rich, sordid, and churlish ; and that his 
collection (as described by Scott ^) "contained 
" the earliest editions of many of our most ex- 
" cellent poems, bound up according to the order 
" of time, with the lowest trash of Grub Street." 
He was an enthusiastic believer in Titus Gates. 
His journal is a record of every canard of 
the day. He ponders gravely on the singular 
coincidence of the names of Green, Berry, and 
Hill, the three unhappy men who were hanged 
for the murder of Sir Edmondbury Godfrey, 

1 Scott's Dryden, i. p. iv. 



104 UNWOETHY OF CEEDIT. 

with the old designation of Primrose Hill, where 
Godfrey's body was discovered, and which went 
formerly by the name of Greenberry Hill. He 
relates the appearance of the ghost of Godfrey 
with as much confidence and as much truth as 
tlie disappearance of Penn/ He records the 
ominous fall of the sceptre from, the hand of the 
statue of Queen Mary at the Exchange.^ He 
asserts that Penn was appointed " supervisor of 
" the excise and hearth money." ^ This was a 
" sham " of some " coffee-house scribblers that 
" skulked within the rules of Gray's Inn and else- 
'' where." ' He says that " the Popish scholars 
" and Fellows of Magdalene College have been 

^ 1678-79, February. "About House whilst service was say- 

tbe middle of this mouth, on a iug." — Vol. i. p. 8. 
Sunday, about eleven in the ^ November 1688. 

morning, a prodigious darkness ^ Lutt. Diary, Aug. 8, 1688 

overspread the face of the sky; i. 453. 

the hke was never known, and * Ellis Corr., ii. 210, 211. 
continued about half-an-hour. ''Another of these shams is 
The darkness was so great that that Mr Penn is made Con- 
in several churches they could troller of Excise arising in tea 
not proceed in divine service and coffee, which is also false, 
without candles; and 'tis said though one might think they 
during that time the figure of might be better informed on 
Sir E. Godfrey appeared in the matters relating to their own 
Queen's Chappie at Somerset trade." See also Penn's letter 

to Popple, 24th Oct. 1688. 



HIS CHAEACTER. 105 

" found since the turning out to have much 
" embezzled the plate belonging to the College. ^ 
*' Dr Smith, one of the Protestant Fellows, sajs : 
" ' Upon a subsequent search and inspection we 
" found our writings and muniments safe — the 
*' old gold in the Tower, which we counted, un- 
" touched and entire — the plate left as we left 
" it — and nothing, as I remember, missing.' " ^ 
He hears that a French ship has been taken, 
in which has been found a chest, containing " a 
" strange sort of knife, about two feet long, with 
" the back to chop, and the point turning in- 
" wards to rip ; " in other words, a common 
hedger's bill ; and he apprehends that it is " for 
" the destruction of Protestants ! " ^ These are 
fair samples of the "Diary." No lie was too 
monstrous, no story too absurd, to find accept- 
ance with Luttrell, provided only it was a Pro- 
testant lie or a Protestant story. It is only 
necessary to refer to any narrative of Penn's life, 
from Oroese and Besse down to Dixon and 
Janney, to find how he was employed during 
his retirement from pubhc life. He remained at 
his usual residence ; he watched over his dying 

1 Vol. i. p. 469. 2 St. Tr., xii. 79. ^ December 1688. 



106 EMPLOYMENT OF PENN DURING 

wife ; and he gave to the workl some of his 
best-known writings. Croese says: "From that 
" time Penn withdrew himself more and more 
" from business, and at length, at London, in 
" his oivn house, confined himself, as it were, to 
" a voluntary exile from the converse, fellowship, 
" and conference of others, employing himself 
" only in his domestic affairs, that he might be 
" devoted more to meditation and spiritual exer- 
" cises."^ Besse, in his quaint and simple lan- 
guage, gives a more detailed accoimt of the mode 
in which Penn employed what Lord Macaulay 
calls these " three years of wandering and lurk- 
" ing."^ " He had hitherto,'' says Besse, " de- 
" fended himself before the King and Council, 
'' but now thought it rather advisable to retire 
" for a time than hazard the sacrificing his inno- 
" cence to the oaths of a profligate villain ; and, 
" accordingly, he appeared hut little in public 
''for tivo or three years. During this recess 
" he applied himself to writing ; and first, lest 
" his own friends the Quakers should entertain 
" any sinister thought of him, he sent the follow- 
" ing epistle to their yearly meeting in London/' 

1 Book ii. p. 102 ; 1696. ^ ^^^ j^^ 31 . ^i 32 . igSS. 



HIS RETIREMENT FROM PUBLIC LIFE. 107 

Of tins communication, which Besse gives at 
length, it is unnecessary to transcribe more than 
the following solemn words : " My privacy is 
" not because men have sworn truly, but falsely 
" against me ; for wicked men have laid in wait 
" for me, and false witnesses have laid to my 
" charge things that I knew not." A fate 
that has pursued him beyond the grave. His 
biographer then proceeds : " His excellent Pre- 
" face to Robert Barclay's works, and another to 
" those of John Burnyeat, both printed this year, 
" were further fruits of his retirement ; as was 
" also a small treatise, entitled ' Just Measures, 
" in an Epistle of Peace and Love to such pro- 
" fessors as are under any dissatisfaction about 
" the present order practised in the Church of 
" Christ.' ' A Key opening the way to every 
" common understanding, &c. &c. ; ' a book so 
" generally accepted, that it has been reprinted 
" even to the twelfth edition. * An Essay to- 
" wards the present peace of Europe : ' a work 
" so adapted to the unsettled condition of the 
" times, and so well received, that it was reprinted 
" the same year." 

" Reflections and Maxims Relating to the 



108 DEATH OF GULIELMA MARIA, 

" Conduct of Human Life — an useful little 
" book, which has also passed many impressions. 
" Having thus improved the times of his retire- 
" ment to his -own comfort and the common 
*' good, it pleased God to dissipate that cloud, 
" and open his way again to a publick service ; 
" for in the latter end of the year 1693, through 
" the mediation of his friends, the Lord Rane- 
" lagh, Lord Somers, Duke of Buckingham, and 
'• Sir John Trenchard, or some of them, he was 
" admitted to appear before the King and Coun- 
" cil, where he so pleaded his innocency that he 
" was acquitted. 

" In the 12th month 1693, departed this life 
" his beloved wife Gulielma Maria, with whom he 
" had lived in aU the endearments of that nearest 
" relation about twenty-one years. The loss of 
" her was a very great exercise — such himself 
" said — as all his other troubles were nothing in 
*' comparison. Her character, dying expressions, 
" and pious end, were related by himself in an 
" account he published, and which is inserted in 
" the appendix." ^ 

1 Bessf/s Life of Penn, pp. 140, HI ; 1726. 



pekn's wife. 109 

Such is the testimony of cotemporaries— 
such were the employments— such the afflictions 
of Penn during the three years which Lord Mac- 
aulay would induce his readers to believe were 
passed in wandering, lurking, and plotting ! 



IX. 



The Ninth and concluding charge brought bj 
Lord Macaulay against Penn is in the following 
passage : ^ — 

" After about three years of wandering and 
" lurking, he, by the mediation of some eminent 
" men, who overlooked his faults for the sake of 
" his good qualities, made his peace with the 
" Government, and again ventured to resume his 
" ministration. The return which he made for 
" the lenity with which he had been treated, does 
" not much raise his character. Scarcely had he 
" began to harangue in public about the unlaw- 
" fulness of war, when he sent a message, earnestly 
" exhorting James to make an immediate descent 
" on England with thirty thousand men." 

Lord Macaulay forgets to state that, amongst 
the eminent men who made his peace with the 

1 Vol. iv. p. 31 ; vi. p. 32 ; 1858. 



FRIENDSHIP OF LOCKE AND SOMEES. Ill 

Government, were Locke and Somers/ The 
attachment of such men weighs more in favour 
of the character of Penn than the animosity of 
Lord Macaulaj against it. 

The charge of " exhorting James to make an 
" immediate descent on England with thirty 
" thousand men," rests upon evidence which will 
not bear a moment's scrutiny. 

In Macpherson s "State-Papers," vol. i. p. 465, 
is preserved a translation of a rough draught, 
professing to contain information collected in 
England by one Captain Williamson, who ap- 
pears to have been employed as a spy on behalf 
of James. The value of the captain's informa- 
tion may be judged of by the fact that, profess- 
ing to be trusted with the secret thoughts of 
Lord Montgomery, the Earl of Aylesbury, the 
Earl of Yarmouth, the Earl of Arran, Sir Tlieo- 
philus Oglethorp, Sir John Friend, Mr Lowton, 
Mr Strode, Mr Ferguson, Mr Penn, and Colonel 
Graham, he finds that each of them severally 
has come to the conclusion that thirty thousand 
men is the exact number required to replace 
King James on the throne, with the addition, in 

' Dixon's Life of Penn, 351, 356, 292. 



112 FOR PENN — WILLIAMSON THE SPY. 

one instance, of a " Black Brigade/' of a peculiar 
character; for one of the persons whose sentiments 
he professes to speak, promises that "he will join 
" to his regiment a company of clergymen of the 
" Chm'ch of England, who are disposed to serve 
" as vohmteers in this expedition — as are, in fact, 
" the majority of the clergy who have not taken 
" the oaths, and also many of them who have 
" taken them/' This is testimony which Lord 
Macaulriy would reject with scorn, were he not 
reduced to the necessity of adopting it to support 
his determination to blacken the character of 
WiUiam Penn. 

There is nothing to show that AVilliamson had 
even the slightest acquaintance with Penn ; and 
there is nothing whatever but this contemptible 
trash to support Lord Macaulay's assertion. 

This brings us to the end of the definite 
charges brought by Lord Macaulay against Wil- 
liam Penn. 

I have not noticed the error with regard to 
Penn's visit to the Hague, because Lord Mac- 
aulay has omitted it from the last edition of his 
History, though without pointing out to his 
readers the mistake into which he had fallen, or 



OBLIGATIONS TO DIXON UNACKNOWLEDGED. US 

acknowledging his obligation to Mr Hepworth 
Dixon for correcting it.^ It is not mj inten- 
tion to follow the sneers or insinuations which 
Lord Macaulaj has scattered through his vol- 
umes, or to speculate upon the motives, public 
or private, which have instigated his conduct. 
It is enough for me if I give the reader, what he 
will certainly not find in the pages of Lord Mac- 
aulay — namely, the means of testing for himself 
the truth of each substantial charge.^ Another 
passage, however, requires notice, not that it in 
any way affects the character of Penn, but because 
it has considerable bearing on the degree of accu- 
racy with which Lord Macaulay has investigated 
the evidence before hazarding very positive as- 
sertion. Besse, the earliest biographer of Penn, 
states, that one of the accusations against Penn 
was " backed by the oath of one William Fuller, 
" a wretch afterwards by Parliament declared a 

^ Compare Mac. 8vo edit, long history, without giving any 

1848, ii. 234, and edit. 1858, ii. clue by which the reader can 

49.3 — Dixon's Life of Pen7i, discern for what facts he con- 

1851, p. 448. siders each to be an authority, 

^ Lord jMacaulay's habit of renders it a work of great la- 
citing a number of authorities, hour to follow him, so as to test 
frequently without specifying his accuracy, 
dates or pages, at the end of a 

H 



114 



WILLIAM FULLEE. 



" cheat and impostor." ^ Lord Macaulaj says 
that this account is "certainly false ;"^ that 
Fuller was not the informer.^ It is not very 
material who was the informer, when the accusa- 
tions brought were of such a nature that, not- 



1 Besse, p. 140. 

2 Mac. iv. 30, note. 

3 Lord Macaulay thus com- 
mences his account of Fuller : 
" Of these double traitors, the 
most remarkable was William 
Ftdler. This man has himself 
told us, that when he was very 
young, he fell in with a pam- 
phlet w/iicA contained an account 
of the flagitious life and horrible 
death of Dangerfield. The boy's 
imagination was set on fire : he 

devoured the book — he almost 
got it by heart ; and he was soon 
seized, and ever after haunted, 
by a strange presentiment that 
his fate would resemble that of 
the wretched adventui'er whose 
history he had so eagerly read. 
It might have been supposed 
that the prospect of dying in 
Newgate, with a back flayed and 
an eye knocked out, would not 
have seemed very attractive. 
But experience proves that there 
are some distempered minds, for 



which notoriety, even when ac- 
companied with pain and shame, 
has an irresistible fascination. 
Animated by this loathsome 
ambition, Fuller equalled, and 
perhaps surpassed, his model." * 
The book referred to by Ful- 
ler as having excited his boyish 
imagination contains no account 
whatever of the " horrible death 
of Dangerfield ; " nor could it, 
for it was published in 1680, 
and Dangerfield's death did not 
take place until 1685.+ Nor 
can it properly be said to con- 
tain any ''account of his flagi- 
tious life." It is an avowed fiction , 
entitled " Don Tomazo, or the 
Juvenile Eambles of Thomas 
Dangerfield," written in imita- 
tion of " The Cheats and Cun- 
ning Contrivances of Guzman 
and Lazarillo de Tormes." The 
hero of the story is Dangerfield, 
and it leaves him, where history 
takes him up, at the period of 
his introduction to Mrs Collier. J 



Mac. iii. 590 ; v. 221 



185S. t EvEf-YN's Diary, 2(1 July 1685. 

X Burnett, ii. 235. 



WILLIAM FULLER. 



115 



witlistancling the strong disposition^ to proceed 
to extremities against Penn, no case could be 



Fuller refers to this book by the 
short title of "Dangerfield's Ram- 
bles," which is used as a heading 
to the pages. He states that he 
met with it whilst staying with 
his stepfather during the sum- 
mer preceding that in which he 
would be of age to choose a guar- 
dian for himself (/. e. fourteen); 
and as Fuller was born in Sep- 
tember 1670,* this must have 
occurred in the summer of 1683. 
Dangerfield's death took place 
in the summer of 16S5 ; so that, 
according to Lord Macaulay, 
Fuller's imagination was in- 
flamed by an event two years 
before it happened ! The cir- 
cumstancesof Dangerfield's death 
are well known. As he was 
returning through Holborn after 
the execution of part of his 
horrible sentence, a gentleman 
of Gray's Inn, of the name of 
Francis, who was accidentally 
walking along the street accom- 
panied by his wife, attracted by 
curiosity, looked in at the 
window of the coach in which 



the prisoner was, and carried 
away by the feelings of detesta- 
tion which the sight of Dan- 
gerfield naturally inspired, ad- 
dressed some taunting words 
to him, which, considering the 
miserable condition of the 
wretched man, might well have 
been spared. Dangerfield re- 
plied with still greater insolence. 
Francis, losing all self-command, 
struck him on the head with a 
small cane. The blow injured 
his eye, and shortly afterwards 
Dangerfield died — his death, it 
was said, being attributable to 
the blow. " The appearance of 
'•' Dangerfield's body, which had 
" been frightfully lacerated with 
" the whip, inclined many to 
" believe that his death was 
" chiefly, if not wholly, caused 
" by the stripes he had received. 
" The Government and the 
" Chief JvTstice thought it con- 
" venient to lay the whole blame 
" on Francis, who, though he 
" seems to have been at worst 
" guilty only of aggravated man- 



* Fuller's Life, p. 2, 4. 



' See the Letters of Lord Carmarthen and Lord Nottingham, 
Dal. App. ii. 187. 



116 



D ANGEEFIELD — EXECUTION 



discovered upon which to found any charge 
that would bear investigation in a court of 



" slaughter, was tried and exe- 
" cuted for murder," ^' So far 
Lord Macaulay is accurate, but 
Francis was a " Tory ; " and 
Lord Macaulay proceeds as fol- 
lows : " His dying speech is one 
" of the most curious monu- 
" ments of that age. The sa- 
" vage spirit which had brought 
" him to the gallows remained 
" with him to the last. Boasts 
" of his loyalty, and abuse of the 
" Whigs, were mingled with the 
" parting ejaculations in which 
" he commended his soul to the 
" Divine mercy. An idle ru- 
" mour had been circulated that 
" his wife was in love with Dan- 
" gerfield, who was eminently 
" handsome, and renowned for 
" gallantry. The fatal blow, it 
" was said, had been prompted 
" by jealousy. The dying hus- 
" band, ivit/i cm earnestness half 
" ridiculous, half pathetic, vin- 
" dicated the lady's character. 
" She was, he said, a virtuous 
" woman ; she came of a loyal 
" stock ; and if she had been 
" inclined to break her mar- 
" riage vow, wotUd at least have 
" selected a Tory and a Church- 
" man for her paramour." f 



Where Lord Macaulay finds 
either the " savage spirit," or 
the " abuse of the Whigs," or 
even the "parting ejaculations," 
it is difficult to say. The dying 
speech of Francis was a written 
paper, carefully prepared, and 
delivered to the Ordinary at the 
place of execution, with a direc- 
tion that it should be published. 
It is almost wholly devoted to 
clearing him of the suspicion of 
having acted with design or pre- 
meditation in the unhappy af- 
fair to which his life was about 
to be sacrificed, or of hav- 
ing borne any personal malice 
against Dangerfield. Nothing 
can be clearer than that he suf- 
fered death most unjustly. In 
no view could his offence be 
held to amount to murder. 
Even admitting that Danger- 
field's death was caused by the 
blow he received from Francis, 
of which there is great doubt, 
that blow was struck in a sudden 
gust of passion, upon an acci- 
dental occasion, without pre- 
meditation, and with a weapon 
(a small cane) very unlikely to 
produce a fatal result. 

Perhaps Lord Macaulay dis- 



Mac. i. 489 ; ii. 64 : 1858. 



t Mac. 



OF FRANCIS. 



117 



justice, even such as courts were in those 
days. But if Penn himself can be supposed, 



covers " abuse of the Whigs " in 
the prayer which Francis offered 
up to " God Almighty to pre- 
serve and bless " King James, 
who had refused mercy to him, 
and was about to sacrifice him 
to the outcry of a '' faction." 
Perhaps he discovers a " savage 
spirit" in the reflection which 
Francis makes, almost in the 
words which Shakespeare has 
placed in the mouth of Wolsey, 
" If I had been as zealous in the 
service of God as my prince, 
He would not have left me so 
much to myself as to have per- 
mitted me to have fallen into 
this unexpected extremity." 

Besides clearing himself of sus- 
picion of the guilt of murder, he 
vindicates the character of his 
wife, which had been assailed by 
base and cowardly slanderers. 
He blesses the Lord that he has 
lived so as " not to be ashamed 
to live or afraid to die." " But," 
he says, " that which most sen- 
sibly afflicts me, and is worse to 
me than death, is, that I cannot 



sufier alone, but that they have 
not only raised scandals upon 
me in particular preparatory to 
it, but upon my poor innocent 
wife, as if my jealousy of her 
had been the reason of my ani- 
mosity to Dangerfield, when I 
am morally certain she never 
saw him in her whole life save 
that fatal moment ; and no cou- 
ple (as hundreds can witness) 
have lived in better correspond- 
ence ; and besides that, she is 
as virtuous a woman as lives, 
and born of so good and loyal * 
a family, that if she had been 
so inclined, she would have 
scorned to have prostituted her 
self to such a profligate person ; 
but, on the contrary (God is my 
witness), I never had any such 
thoughts of her, and do as verily 
believe, as there is a God in 
heaven, I never had any reason, 
she having always been the most 
indulgent, kind, and loving wife 
that ever man had, and in my 
conscience one of the best of 
women." t 



* Loyal; 1, Obedient ; 2, Faithful in love. 

" Hail, wedded love ! by thee 

Founded in reason, loyal, just, and pure." — Milton. 

Johnson's Dictionary. 
+ 11 St. Tr., 509. 



118 



DANGERFIELD — LETTER OF PENN 



notwithstanding Lord Macaulaj's assertion, to 
have known anything about the matter, it is 



What Lord Macaulay finds 
" ridiculous" in this vindication 
of his slandered wife by a man 
on the brink of eternity, 1 am 
at a loss to discover. The non- 
sense about " selecting a Tory 
and a Churchman for her para- 
mour,^^ is Lord Macaulay 's own. 
Nothing of the kind can be 
traced in the speech of Francis, 
which will be found at length 
in the Appendix. It is worth 
perusal, in order to see what 
Lord Macaulay considers to be 
" one of the most curious monu- 
ments of that age," though the 
reader will probably be as much 
puzzled to discover how it is 
entitled to that distinction as to 
find either the " savage spirit " 
which Lord Macaulay discerns, 
or the " abuse of the Whigs,''^ 
which is so capital an oflfence in 
his eyes. 

In the first volume of Lord 
Macaulay's history, p. 488,* there 
is the following note with regard 
to Dangerfield : " According to 
" Roger North, the judges de- 
" cided that Dangerfield, having 
" been previously convicted of 
" perjury, was incompetent to 
" be a witness of the plot. But 



" this is one among many in- 
" stances of Roger s inaccuracy' 
" It apppears from the report of 
" the Trial of Lord Castlemaine, 
" in June 1680, that after much 
" altercation between counsel 
" and much consultation among 
" the judges of the different 
" courts in Westminster Hall, 
" Dangerfield was sworn, and 
" suffered to tell his story ; but 
" the jury very properly refused 
" to believe him." This is one 
of the many inaccuracies, not 
of Roger North, but of Lord 
Macaulay. North refers not to 
Lord Castlemaine's trial, but to 
that of Mrs Cellier, 7 St. Tri. 
1043, where Dangerfield was 
tendered as a witness and re- 
jected. It is the more singular 
that Lord Macaulay should have 
fallen into this error, and 
grounded upon it his sneer at 
North, inasmuch as the rejec- 
tion of Dangerfield is made the 
subject of remark in Mr Har- 
greave's learned argument on 
the effect of the King's pardon 
of perjviry ; and the debate of 
the judges on the question of 
admissibility, is reported by Sir 
T. Raymond, p. 369, who states 



Vol. ii. 63 J 1858. 



AS TO FULLER'S ACCUSATION. 119 

" certainly true " that Fuller was one of tlie in- 
formers. Besse may have fallen into some inac- 
curacy as to the date or the particular occasion, 
but the following letter is conclusive as to tlie 
main fact : — 

" I have been above these three years hunted 
" up and down, and could never be allowed to 
" live quietly in city or country, even then when 
" there was hardly a pretence against me, so that 
" I have not only been unprotected, but perse- 
" cuted by the Government. And before the 
" date of this business which is laid to my charge, 
" I was indicted for high treason in Ireland, be- 
" fore the Grand Jury of Dublin, and a Bill found 
" upon the oaths of three scandalous men. Fuller, 

that they were divided in judgments, with arser de mam, 

opinion, the majoriti/ being for pillory, prison, breach, and what 

rejecting the testimony, which not of villainy, and almost every 

was accordingly done. The pas- species of crime ; then by proof 

sage in North's Examen, is as showed so many ill things of 

follows : — " But then as soon as him, as the court was soon satis- 

Dangerfield advanced, the wo- fied to reject him as a witness. ., . 

man" [i.e. Cellier] "charged In fine, the fellow was exploded 

with fury upon him with an with ignominy, and sent home 

whole battery of records, being to Newgate again, and the pri- 

convictions, outlawries, and soner was acquitted." * 



* Etanten, p. 263. 7 St. Tri. 1053, Hargreave's note. Sir T. Raymond's re- 
ports, 369, a note of tlie case. The Ch. Justice Raymond, and Nicliols, were for 
rejecting, Jones and Dolben for admitting him ; he was consequently rejected. 



120 LETTER OF PENN AS TO 

" one Fisher, and an Irishman, whom I knew 
" not, and the last has not been in England since 
" the revolution, nor I in Ireland these twenty 
" years, nor do I so much as know him by name ; 
"and all their evidence upon hearsay too. It 
" may be that it is the most extraordinary case 

•' that has been known ; that 

" an Englishman in England, walking about 
" the streets, should have a bill of high treason 
" found against him in Ireland for a fact pre- 
" tended to be committed in England, when a 
" man cannot legally be tried in one county in 
" England for a crime committed in another. 
" And the others are at ease that were accused 
" for the same fault, and that Fuller is na- 
'' tionally staged and censured for an impostor 
" that was the chief of my accusers ; my estate 
" in Ireland is, notwithstanding, lately put up 
" among the estates of outlaws, to be leased 
" for the Crown, and the collector of the hun- 
" dred where it lies ordered to seize my rents, 
" and lease it in the name of the Govern- 
" ment, and yet though I am not convicted or 
" outlawed." .... 



fullee's accusation. 121 

" I know mine enemies, and their true character 
" and history, and their intrinsic value to this or 
" other Governments. I commit them to time, 
" with my own conduct and afiflictions." ^ 

I commenced these remarks with Lord Mac- 
aiday's own record of the judgment of posterity on 
the character of William Penn — I conclude them 
with the echo of that judgment which comes back 
clear and distinct over the broad waves of the 
Atlantic. 

" There is nothing in the history of the human 
" race like the confidence which the simple virtues 
" and institutions of William Penn inspired. . . 
" After more than a century, the laws which 
" he reproved began gradually to be repealed, 
" and the principle which he developed, secure 
" of immortality, is slowly, but firmly, asserting 
" its power over the Legislature of Great Britain. 
" . . . . Every charge of hypocrisy, of self- 
" ishness, of vanity, of dissimulation, of credulous 
" confidence — every form of reproach, from viru- 
" lent abuse to cold apology — every ill name, 
" from Tory and Jesuit to blasphemer and infi- 

^ Penn's letter to , 1693. Jannei's Life of Perm, 379. 



122 CONCLUSION. 

" del, has been used against Penn — but the can- 
*' dour of his character always triumphed over 
" calumny. 

" His name was safely cherished as a house- 
" hold word in the cottages of Wales and Ireland, 
" and among the peasantry of Germany, and not 
" a tenant of a wigwam, from the sea to the Sus- 
" quehanna, doubted his integrity. 

" His fame is now wide in the world : he is 
" one of the few w^ho have gained abiding 
" glory." 1 



1 Bancroft's History U. S., ii. 381, 400. Janney, Life of Penn, 
5G7. 



APPENDIX. 



No. I. 

His Majesty's gracious Declaration to all his loving 
Subjects for Liberty of Conscience. 

James K. 

It having pleased Almighty God not only 
to bring us to the Imperial Crown of these Kingdoms 
through the greatest difficulties, but to preserve us by 
a more than ordinary Providence upon the Throne of 
our royal ancestors, there is nothing now that we so 
earnestly desire as to establish our Government on 
such a foundation as may make our subjects happy, 
and unite them to us by inclination as well as duty, 
wliich we tliink may be done by no means so effectually 
as by granting to them the free exercise of their reli- 
gion for the time to come ; and add that to the perfect 
enjoyment of their property, which has never been in 
any case invaded by us since our coming to the Crown 
— which being the two things men value most, shall 
ever be preserved in these Kingdoms, during our reign 
over them, as the tmest methods of their peace and 



124 THE king's declaration 

our glory. We cannot but heartily wish, as it will 
easily be believed, that all the people of our dominions 
were members of the Catholick Church ; yet w^e 
humbly thank Almighty Grod it is, and hath of long- 
time been, our constant desire and opinion (which 
upon diverse occasions we have declared), that con- 
science ought not to be constrained, nor people forced 
in matters of meer religion. It has ever been directly 
contrary to our inclination, as we think it is to the 
interest of Government, which it destroys by spoiling 
trade, depopulating countries, and discouraging stran- 
gers ; and, finally, that it never obtained the end 
for which it was employed. And in this we are the 
more confirmed by the reflections we have made upon 
the conduct of the four last reigns ; for after all the 
frequent and pressing endeavours that were used in 
each of them to reduce this kingdom to an exact con- 
formity in religion, it is visible the success has not 
answered the design, and that the difficulty is invin- 
cible. We, therefore, out of our princely care and 
affection unto all our loving subjects, that they may 
live at ease and quiet, and for the increase of trade 
and encouragement of strangers, have thought fit, by 
virtue of our royal prerogative, to issue forth this our 
royal Declaration of Indulgence, making no doubt of 
the concurrence of our two Houses of Parliament, when 
we shall think it convenient for them to meet. 

In the first place, we do declare that we shall pro- 
tect and maintain our arch-bishops, bishops, and 
clergy, and all other our subjects of the Church of 
England, in the free exercise of their reHgion, as by 
law established, and in the quiet and full enjoyment of 



AS TO LIBEETY OF CONSCIENCE. 125 

all their possessions, without any molestation or dis- 
turbance whatsoever. 

We do likewise declare, that it is our Eoyal will and 
pleasure, that from henceforth the execution of all and 
all manner of penal laws in matters ecclesiastical, for 
not coming to Church, or not receiving the Sacrament, 
or for any other non-conformity to the religion estab- 
lished, or for or by reason of the exercise of religion in 
any manner whatsoever, be immediately suspended; 
and the further execution of the said penal laws, and 
every of them, is hereby suspended. 

And to the end that by the liberty hereby granted, 
the peace and security of our Government in the prac- 
tice thereof may not be endangered, we have thought 
fit, and do hereby strictly charge and command all our 
loving subjects, that, as we do freely give them leave 
to meet and serve God after their own way and man- 
ner, be it in private houses or in places purposely 
hired or built for that use, so that they take especial 
care that nothing be preached or taught among them 
which may any ways tend to alienate the hearts of our 
people from us or our Government ; and that their 
meetings and assemblies be peaceably, openly, and 
publicly held, and all persons freely admitted to them ; 
and that they do signify and make known to some one 
or more of the next justices of the peace what place or 
places they set apart for those uses. 

And that all our subjects may enjoy such their reli- 
gious assemblies with greater assurance and protec- 
tion, we have thought it requisite, and do hereby 
command, that no disturbance of any kind be made or 
given to them, under pain of our displeasure, and to be 



126 THE KING'S DECLARATION 

further proceeded against with the utmost severity. 
And forasmuch as we are desirous to have the benefit 
of the service of all our loving subjects, which by the 
law of nature is inseparably annexed to, and inherent 
in our royal person, and that none of our subjects may 
for the future be under any discouragement or dis- 
ability (who are otherwise well inclined and fit to 
serve us), by reason of some oaths or tests that have 
been usually administered on such occasions, we do 
hereby further declare that it is our Eoyal will and 
pleasure that the oaths commonly called the Oaths of 
Supremacy and Allegiance, and also the several tests 
and declarations mentioned in the Acts of Parliament 
made in the twenty-fifth and thirtieth years of the 
reign of our late Eoyal brother. King Charles the 
Second, shall not at any time hereafter be required to 
be taken, declared, or subscribed by any person or 
persons whatsoever, who is, or shall be, employed in 
any office or place of trust, either civil or military, 
under us or in our Government. And we do further 
declare it to be our pleasure and intention, from time 
to time hereafter, to grant our Eoyal dispensations 
under our Great Seal to all our loving subjects so to be 
employed who shall not take the said oaths, or sub- 
scribe or declare the said tests, or declarations in the 
above-mentioned Acts, and every of them. 

And to the end that all our loving subjects may 
derive and enjoy the full benefit and advantage of our 
gracious indulgence hereby intended, and may be 
acquitted and discharged from all pains, penalties, 
forfeitures, and disabilities by them, or any of them, 
incurred or forfeited, or which they shall or may at 



AS TO LIBERTY OF CONSCIENCE. 127 

any time hereafter be liable to, for or by reason of 
their non- conformity, or the exercise of their religion, 
and from all suits, troubles,'" or disturbances for the 
same ; we do hereby give our free and ample pardon 
unto all Non- conformists, Kecusants, and other our 
loving subjects, for all crimes and things by them 
committed, contrary to the penal laws formerly made 
relating to religion, and the profession or exercise 
thereof, hereby declaring that this our Royal pardon 
and indem]3nity shall be as good and effectual to all 
intents and purposes, as if every individual person had 
been therein particularly named, or had particular 
pardons under our Great Seal ; which we do likewise 
declare shall from time to time be granted unto any 
person or persons desiring the same ; wiUing and re- 
quiring our judges, justices, and other officers, to take 
notice of, and obey our Eoyal wdll and pleasure herein- 
before declared. 

And although the freedom and assurance we have 
hereby given in relation to religion and property 
might be sufficient to remove from the minds of our 
loving subjects all fears and jealousies in relation to 
either, yet we have thought fit further to declare, that 
we will maintain them in all their properties and pos- 
sessions, as well of Church and Abbey-lands as in any 
other their lands and properties whatsoever. 

Given at our Court at Whitehall, the fourth day of 
April 1687, in the third year of our reign. By 
his Majesty's special command. 



128 penn's speech on 



No. II. 

William Penn's Speech to the King upon delivering 
THE Quakers' Addeess. 

May it please the King, — 

It was the saying of our blessed Lord to the 
captious Jews in the case of tribute, " Kender to Csesar 
the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that 
are God's." As this distinction ought to be observed 
by all men in the conduct of their lives, so the King 
has given us an illustrious example, in his own person, 
that excites us to it : for while he was a subject, he 
gave Cfesar his tribute, and now he is a Caesar, gives 
God his due — viz. the sovereignty over conscience. 
It were a great shame then for any Englishman (that 
professes Christianity) not to give God his due. By 
this grace he hath relieved his distressed subjects 
from their cruel sufferings, and raised to himself a 
new and lasting empire by adding their affections to 
their duty. And we pray God to continue the King 
in this noble resolution ; for he is now upon a prin- 
ciple that has good-nature, Christianity, and the good 
of civil society, on its side — a security to him beyond 
the little arts of Government. 

I would not that any should think that we came 
hither with design to fill the Gazette with our thanks ; 
but as our sufferings would have moved stones to 
compassion, so we should be harder if we were not 
moved to gratitude. 

Now since the King's mercy and goodness have 



DELIVERING THE QUAKEES' ADDRESS. 129 

reached to us tlironghont the Kingdom of England 
and Principality of Wales, our General Assembly from 
all those parts met at London about our Church affairs, 
has appointed us to wait upon the King with our 
humble thanks, and me to deliver them, which I do 
by this Address with all the affection and respect of a 
dutiful subject. 

THE ADDRESS. 

To King James the Second, over England, &c., the 
humble and grateful Acknowledgment of his 
peaceable subjects, called Quakers, in this king- 
dom, from their usual yearly Meeting in London, 
the nineteenth day of the third month, vulgarly 
called May 1687 ;— 

We cannot but bless and praise the name of 
Almighty God, who hath the hearts of Princes in his 
liand, that he hath inclined the King to hear the cries 
of his suffering subjects for conscience sake ; and we 
rejoice that instead of troubling him with complaints 
of our sufferings, he hath given us so eminent an occa- 
sion to present him with our thanks. And since it 
hath pleased the King, out of his great compassion, 
thus to commiserate our afflicted condition, which hath 
so particularly appeared by his gracious proclamation 
and warrants last year, whereby twelve hundred prisoners 
were released from their severe impriso7imejits, and many 
others from spoil and ruin in their estates and proper- 
ties ; and his princely speech in Council and Christian 
Declaration for Liberty of Conscience, in which he doth 
not only express his aversion to all force upon con- 



130 THE king's answer TO THE ADDEESS. 

science, and grant his Dissenting subjects an ample 
liberty to worship God in the way they are persuaded 
is most agreeable to His will, but gives them his 
kingly word the same shall continue during his reign; 
we do (as our friends of this city have already done) 
render the King our humble. Christian, and thankful 
acknowledgments, not only in behalf of ourselves, but 
with respect to our friends throughout England and 
Wales ; and pray God with all our hearts to bless and 
preserve thee, King, and those under thee in so good 
a work ! And as we can assure the King it is well 
accepted in the several counties from whence we came, 
so we hope the good effects thereof for the peace, trade, 
and prosperity of the kingdom will produce such a con- 
currence from the Parliament as may secure it to our 
j^osterity in after times. And while we live, it shall 
be our endeavour (through God's grace) to demean 
ourselves as in conscience to God, and duty to the 
King, we are obliged. 

His peaceable, loving, and faithful Subjects. 



THE KING'S ANSWER 

Gentlemen, — I thank you heartily for your Address. 
Some of you know (I am sure you do, Mr Penn) that it 
was always my principle that conscience ought not to be 
forced, and that all men ought to have the liberty of 
their consciences ; and what I have promised in my 
Declaration, I will continue to perform as long as I 
live ; and I hope, before I die, to settle it so that after 
ages shall have no reason to alter it. 



EOBEET FEANCIS. 131 



No. III. 

The dying Speech of Eobeet Feancis, of Gray's 
Inn, Esq., July 24, 1685, delivered by his own hand 
to the Ordinary at the place of Execution, desiring 
the same might be published. 

I AM here, by the divine permission and providence 
of God, become a spectacle to God, angels, and men, 
for a rash, extravagant, and imprudent act, wherein I 
do confess I have not only offended against the gov- 
ernment and courts of justice, but against Christianity, 
and even the rules of morality itself. Nevertheless 
(I hope) not only the Court, but all unbiassed men, 
from the several circumstances of the fact, are satis- 
fied that I had no malicious intent of doing what fell 
out, nor had any grudge or personal prejudice to liini 
upon any account whatsoever, more than what all 
honest and good men could not but have, that love the 
king and the government. The solemn truth of all 
which I have declared, not only ujDon the holy sacra- 
ment I received from Mr Master, but also that I never 
knew nor saw him before that unhappy moment, save 
once at a distance in the pillory at Westminster, and 
do now, as a dying man, solemnly avow and protest 
the same. I therefore, I hope, I may boldly say, I am 
not conscious of any guilt before God as to the malice. 
However, God in His great wisdom has been pleased 
to suffer this great calamity to fall upon me, and I 
hope this His severe chastisement is in order to bring 
me to Himself, when softer means had not sufficiently 



]32 HIS DYING SPEECH, 

done it. All tliem that know me (I am sure) will do 
me that justice as to believe I am far from having 
done it either wilfully or mercenarily (as most untruly 
is reported). And that these honourable persons are 
above the thoughts of such unworthy things, for which 
they have been as maliciously as falsely traduced upon 
my score ; I beg their pardon for the scandal I have 
unhappily been the occasion of, and desire this acknow- 
ledgment may be by them accepted as a reparation, 
since to disown it at this time of ni}^ death is all the 
satisfaction I am able to make them. As to my reli- 
gion (however I have been represented), there are 
people that knew me at the University, and since that 
can be my witnesses, how obedient and zealous a son 
of the Church of England (by law established) I have 
been. And these worthy divines that did me the 
favour to visit me in affliction, will give the world an 
account (as occasion serves) of my integrity therein ; 
and if I had been as zealous in the service of God as 
my Prince, he would not have left me so much to my- 
self, as to have permitted me to have fallen into this 
unexpected extremity. And as for my morals, the hon- 
ourable Society of Gray's Inn will answer for me, that 
in above these twelve years time I have had the hon- 
our of being admitted a member of that Society, I 
never had any quarrel or controversy with any mem- 
ber thereof; and all persons with whom I have had 
conversation, I question not, will give a good charac- 
ter of my innocent and peaceable behaviour. I pray 
God Almighty preserve and bless his most sacred 
Majesty, his royal consort Queen Maiy, Catherine the 



DELIVERED BY HIS OWN HAND "133 

Queen Dowager, their royal highnesses, and all the 
royal family ; and grant that these may never want 
one of* that royal line to sway the sceptres of these 
kingdoms as long as sun and moon endure. In the 
union and love of his subjects, strengthen him that he 
may vanquish and overcome all his enemies, which I 
am g\-dd to have seen so much prospect of, and am 
only sorry I am cut off from seeing my so much-desired 
satisfaction of those happy days all his good subjects 
will enjoy under his auspicious government. I pray 
God forgive me my sins that have made me unworthy of 
that blessing. Blessed be the Lord that I have lived, 
so as not to be ashamed to live, or afraid to die ; 
though I cannot but regret my being made a sacrifice 
to the faction who, I am satisfied, are the only people 
that will rejoice in my ruin ; for there is no man that 
loves his Prince, but M'ill lament that nothing less 
than the blood of an inoffensive man (save in this 
single extravagance) can satisfy them for the sudden 
intemperate transport of zeal and passion against one 
so notoriously wicked and infamous ; fori do protest, 
before Almighty God (before whom I shall imme- 
diately appear), that when I went to the coach-side, 
I did not intend so much as to speak to him, or believe 
I could have had opportunity of so doing, much less 
of doing him any harm. Neither is it probable I 
shoLild, w4th a small bamboo-cane, no bigger than a 
man's little finger, without any iron upon it, much 
less a dart in it, as it was most industriously spread 
abroad to prejudice me in the opinion of the world ; 
for, if I had had such a wicked design intentionally, I 



134 TO THE OEDINAEY 

liad a little short sword by my side mucli more proper 
for such a purpose. And further, if I had believed or 
known that I had done any harm to him, I had oppor- 
tunity enough of escaping afterwards, which I never 
endeavoured. Now, all these things being duly 
weighed with their several circumstances, I leave my 
sad case to the consideration of all sober and chari- 
table men. However, I would not have this to be in- 
terpreted as a reflection upon the Court, who, I doubt 
not, are by this time satisfied (and Mr Recorder did 
in open Court declare) that in their consciences they 
did not believe I maliciously designed him the mis- 
chief that happened, but that it was purely accidental. 
But in the strict construction of law, I was found 
guilty of murder. But that which most sensibly 
afflicts me, and is worse to me than death, that I can- 
not suffer alone, but that they have not only raised 
scandals upon me in particular preparatory to it, but 
upon my poor innocent wife, as if my jealousy of her 
had been the reason of my animosity to Dangerfield, 
when' I am morally certain she never saw him in her 
whole life, save that fatal moment, and no couple (as 
hundreds can witness) have lived in better correspon- 
dence. And, besides that, she is as virtuous a woman 
as lives, and born of so good and loyal a family, that 
if she had been so inclined, she would have scorned to 
have prostituted herself to such a profligate person ; 
but, on the contrary (God is my witness), I never had 
any such thoughts of her, and do as verily believe, as 
there is a God in heaven, I never had any reason, she 
having always been the most indulgent, kind, and 



AT THE PLACE OF EXECUTION. 135 

loving wife that ever man had, and, in my conscience, 
one of the best of women ; nay, I am so far from sus- 
pecting her virtue, that she is the only loss I regret on 
earth, and can freely part with every thing else here 
below without repining, which in all my trouble I have 
owned before all people, and particularly Mr Master, 
Mr Ordinary, and Mr Smithies of Cripplegate, who 
can all testify those tears and endeared expressions 
that have passed between us when any of them did 
me the kindness to visit me in my distress. And I do, 
from the bottom of my heart, freely forgive the wit- 
nesses that swore against me those words I never 
s]Doke ; for, as I shall answer at the great tribunal, I 
said no other or more words than these : How, now, 
friend, have you had your heat this morning ? For all 
the ill they have done me, give them repentance, good 
God ! Even for those that have contributed to the 
shedding of my blood, I pray thee shed thy bowels of 
mercy ! 

I do heartily thank tliose noble and honourable per- 
sons, and all other my friends that have so charitably 
interposed with his Majesty on my behalf (though it 
hath proved unsuccessful). I pray God, nevertheless, 
to return their kind endeavours a thousandfold into 
their own bosoms ! Lord, return it to them and theirs ! 
Lord Jesus, receive my soul ! Thy will be done on 
earth, as it is in heaven. Amen, Amen, Amen. 

ROBERT FRANCIS. 



136 LETTER OF THE EAEL OF CRAFURD 



- No. IV. 

Earl of Crafurd to the Earl of Melvill, 
nth December 1690. 

My Lord, 

Yesterday in the afternoon, Nevill Pemi 
(after near an hour's discourse I had with him in name 
of the Council, and in their presence, though at several 
times, by turning him out, and then calling him in 
again) was questioned upon some things that were 
not of the deejDest concern, and had but gentle torture 
given him, being resolved to repeat it this day, which 
accordingly, about six in the evening, we inflicted on 
both thumbs and one of his leggs, with all the seve- 
rity that was consistent with humanity, even unto 
that pitch that we could not preserve life and have 
gone further, but without the least success ; for his 
answers to our whole interrogators that were of any 
import were negatives. Yea, he was so manly and 
resolute under his suffering, that such of the Council 
as were not acquainted with all the evidences, were 
brangled, and began to give him charitie that he 
might be innocent. It was surprising to me and 
others that flesh and blood could, without faint- 
ing, and in contradiction to the grounds we had in- 
sinuat of our knowledge of his accession in matters, 
endure the heavy penance he was in for two houres ; 
nor can I suggest any other reason than this, that by 
his religion and its dictates, he did conceive he was 
acting a thing not only generous towards his friends 



TO THE EARL OF MELVILL, 137 

and accomplices, but likewise so meritorious, that lie 
would thereby save his soule, and be canonised among 
their saints. My stomach is truly so far out of tune 
by being a witnes to an act so farr cross to my natural 
temper, that I am fitter for rest than anything ells ; 
nor could any less than the danger from such con- 
4)pirators to the person of our incomparable King, and 
the safety of his government, prevailed over me to 
have in the council's name been the prompter of the 
executioner to increase the torture to so high a 
pitch, I leave it to other hands to acquaint your Lop : 
how severals of our number were shie to consent to 
the torture, and left the Board, when by a vote they 
were overruled in this. I shal not deny them my 
charitie, that this was an effect of the gentleness of 
their nature, though some others of a more jealous 
temper than I am put truly another construction upon 
it. Penn does now crave banishment for a year to 
Holland, under a deep penaltie. I think he would ' 
willingly stoop to it that it were under the pain of 
<leath ; but I am no agent for him, and only speaks out 
his own w^ords, which, after his torture, he desired I 
might represent to my master, for the sake of God, 
which I no way engaged for ; and only acquaints your 
Lop: that you have the outmost information in this 
matter that can be given you by, my dear Lord, your 
Lops : ever faithfull and affectionate humble servant, 

CRAFUED.* 



LeTen aud Melville Papers, p. 582— Bannatyne Club Publication. 



/ ^ 

138 OF DATE llTH DECEMBEE 1690. 

The question of the share of responsibility to be 
fairly allotted to each of the participants in this hor- 
rible transaction is far too wide for me to eoter upon, 
and will, I am informed, be fully dealt with ere long 
by other hands. 



PKISTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SOJfS, EDLNBUKGH. 



t 



